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LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

University  of  California. 

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OOMPrOM^KNTS    OF    THE 


PRESIDENT  AND  TRUSTEES 

OF  DARTMOUTH   OOLI^EGE 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2007  with  funding  from 

IVIicrosoft  Corporation 


http://www.archive.org/details/exercisesaddressOOdartrich 


DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 


OF  THE 


OF   THE 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 


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EXERCISES  AND  ADDRESSES 


ATTENDING  THE 


Eaptttg  of  tj)e  Corner^^tone 


OF  THE 


ileto  Bartmouti)  Hall 

AND  THE 

VISIT  OF  THE  EARL  OF  DARTMOUTH  TO  THE  COLLEGE 

OCTOBER  25  AND  26,  1904 


EDITED  BY  ERNEST  MARTIN  HOPKINS 

SECRETARY  TO  THE  PRESIDENT 


^  OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY 

Of 


HANOVER,  N.  H. 

iPrintelr  for  tfje  College 
1905 


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Tui  University  Pkbss,  Cambridge,  U.S.A. 


LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS 

Dartmouth  Hall Frontispiece 

John  Wentworth Facing  page      8 

Laying   of  the   Corner-stone   of   the   New 

Dartmouth  Hall "  14 

Eleazar  Wheelock " 

Samson  Occom " 

John  Thornton "  42 

William  Legge "  50 

Grave  of  Eleazar  Wheelock "  75 

WiLLUM  Heneage  Legge "  78 

Arms  of  the  Second  Earl  of  Dartmouth    .  "  90 

Washington's  Book-plate  and  Arms      ...  **  92 


24 
32 


INTRODUCTION 


or 

INTRODUCTION 

^T  the  time  of  its  burning  —  Thursday  morning,  Feb- 
/~\  ruary  i8,  1904 —  Dartmouth  Hall  was  probably  the 
-**  -^  most  interesting  and  characteristic  college  building 
in  the  United  States.  Others  were  older  or  costlier,  but 
none  so  intimately  connected  with  all  the  history  and  life 
of  an  institution  of  learning.  From  1786  to  1828  it  housed 
nearly  all  the  work  of  the  College,  and  in  the  succeeding 
years,  rising  above  the  broad  campus,  in  the  middle  of  the 
"  old  row,"  its  graceful  proportions  and  unsurpassed  belfry 
stood  constantly,  in  the  mind  of  every  Dartmouth  man,  as 
the  innermost  shrine  of  his  academic  love. 

Externally,  the  hall,  in  its  earliest  and  latest  years,  was 
recognized  as  one  of  the  best  examples  of  college  archi- 
tecture of  the  colonial  period ;  somewhat  similar  (and  the 
only  two  remaining)  buildings  being  Nassau  Hall  at  Prince- 
ton, which  has  been  twice  burned,  and  University  Hall  at 
Brown.  Though  Eleazar  Wheelock's  original  plan  for  a 
stone  or  brick  building  was  relinquished,  his  attendant  plan 
of  using  Nassau  Hall  as  a  general  model  was  carried  out  in 
detail.  The  proportions  of  Old  Dartmouth,  however,  not- 
withstanding its  less  expensive  material,  have  been  de- 
clared by  architectural  experts  to  be  more  artistic  and 
impressive  than  those  of  its  model.  The  building  as 
originally  constructed,  says  Mr.  Chase,  **  was  reputed  the 
largest  of  its  kind  in  New  England."  Its  interior  was 
several  times  modified  and  improved,  but  its  exterior 
remained  practically  the  same  from  the  beginning. 


4  DARTMOUTH   HALL   CORNER-STONE 

For  forty  years  Dartmouth  Hall  met  nearly  all  the 
College  requirements  for  recitation  rooms,  dormitories, 
libraries,  and  apparatus.  From  1791  to  1840  the  College 
and  society  libraries  were  kept  in  it.  From  1799  to  181 1 
the  Medical  School  occupied  portions  of  the  building. 
Until  1828  there  was  a  museum  on  the  third  floor.  Of 
late  years  the  first  and  second  floors  of  the  building  were 
used  principally  for  recitation  purposes  by  the  departments 
of  Latin,  Greek,  French,  and  German,  leaving  only  the 
third  floor  for  students*  rooms. 

The  portion  of  Dartmouth  Hall  about  which  centered 
the  most  varied  emotions  was  the  Old  Chapel.  This  was 
evolved  by  a  remodelling  of  two  stories  in  the  central 
portion  of  the  building  in  1828,  when  the  wooden  chapel 
standing  in  front  of  Thornton  was  removed.  From  this 
date  until  the  erection  of  Rollins  Chapel  in  1885  this  Old 
Chapel  was  the  center  of  the  religious  life  of  the  College. 
Here  met,  for  morning  prayers,  all  the  classes  from  that  of 
1829  to  that  of  1888.  Here  for  many  years,  also,  the 
classes  gathered  for  oratorical  work,  and  on  Wednesday 
afternoons  successive  generations  of  seniors  addressed  the 
College  in  Rhetoricals.  Here  too,  from  early  days  were 
held  mass  meetings  to  arouse  enthusiasm  for  various 
branches  of  undergraduate  activity,  and  seldom  did  the 
attempt  fail;  and  here,  until  the  construction  of  College 
Hall,  occurred  the  exercises  of  "  Dartmouth  Night,"  the 
annual  event  which  has  done  so  much  to  promote  the 
Dartmouth  spirit.  It  was  used  for  an  athletic  meeting 
the  very  evening  before  the  fire. 

Old  Dartmouth  was  thus  hallowed  by  sentiment  and 
revered  by  association.  Even  its  faults  of  inner  construc- 
tion and  the  innumerable  pranks  played  within  its  ancient 
walls  gave  it  a  personal  character  and  endeared  it  to 
thousands  of  alumni.     It  was  *'  the  only  link  which  Dart- 


INTRODUCTION  5 

mouth  had,  physically,  with  its  early  days."  The  names 
of  nearly  all  of  the  famous  graduates  are  inseparably 
connected  with  it.  The  picture  of  Dartmouth  Hall 
is  a  permanent  part  of  the  brain  of  every  Dartmouth 
man. 

"  When  the  deep  current  of  Webster's  emotions  rose  to 
the  surface  and  flowed  forth  in  inspired  speech  that  moved 
his  hearers  to  tears  as  he  pleaded  for  the  life  and  the 
independence  of  the  College,  and  spoke  of  *  those  who  love 
it,'  the  tangible  symbol  in  his  mind  was  doubtless  Dart- 
mouth Hall." 


While  Dartmouth  Hall  was  burning,  a  meeting  of  the 
Trustees  was  called  to  consider  the  best  means  of  repairing, 
so  far  as  possible,  the  loss.  At  an  earlier  hour  even,  as  soon 
as  the  news  of  the  fire  had  reached  Boston,  a  call  was 
issued  by  Melvin  O.  Adams,  Esq.,  the  alumni  trustee  for 
Boston,  to  the  alumni  of  the  vicinity  for  a  rally  in  Tremont 
Temple  on  the  following  Saturday  at  3  p.  m.  In  the 
expressive  language  of  the  call,  it  was  "  not  an  invitation, 
but  a  summons."  In  the  spirit  of  these  words,  and  under 
the  urgency  of  the  situation,  the  following  resolutions 
were  adopted  by  the  Trustees: 

The  Trustees  of  Dartmouth  College,  in  session  February  20, 
1904,  recognizing  the  great  calamity  which  has  fallen  upon  the 
College  by  the  burning,  on  the  morning  of  February  18,  of  Dart- 
mouth Hall,  which  embodied  almost  from  the  first  the  traditions  of 
the  College,  and  which  stood  to  the  last  as  the  embodiment  in  so 
large  degree  of  the  present  and  active  life  of  the  College,  have 
placed  upon  their  records  the  following  resolutions,  which  they 
submit  to  the  alumni  and  friends  of  Dartmouth  College,  whose  un- 
wavering loyalty  they  are  confident  may  be  depended  upon  to 
carry  them  into  effect. 

Resolved^  that  immediate  steps  be  taken  to  raise  funds  sufficient 
to  reproduce  in  more  permanent  form  Dartmouth  Hall  upon  the 


6  DARTMOUTH   HALL   CORNER-STONE 

present  site,  and  to  provide  for  those  uses  which  it  represented  in 
the  working  life  of  the  College. 

Resolved^  that  in  the  judgment  of  the  Trustees  the  sum  of  two  hun- 
dred and  fifty  thousand  dollars  will  be  required  to  carry  out  these 
plans,  of  which  a  formal  statement  with  suitable  details  will  soon  be 
put  before  the  alumni. 

Resolvedy  that  a  central  committee  be  appointed  by  the  President 
of  the  College  to  cooperate  with  subcommittees,  to  be  appointed 
by  local  associations  of  the  alumni,  in  raising  the  money  required. 

Resolved,  that  a  copy  of  these  resolutions  be  forwarded  to  the 
secretary  of  each  alumni  association  with  the  request  that  a  meeting 
of  such  association  be  called  as  early  as  practicable  to  take  action 
upon  the  matter  and  report  at  once  to  the  President  of  the  College. 

To  carry  out  the  resolution  of  the  Trustees  calling  for  the  sum 
of  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  dollars,  the  President  was  author- 
ized to  appoint  a  central  committee  from  the  alumni  whose  duty  it 
should  be  to  cooperate  with  committees  from  the  local  associations. 
The  President  appointed  as  this  committee  :  Melvin  O.  Adams, 
Esq.,  class  of '71, Boston,  chairman,  Charles  F.  Mathewson,  Esq., 
class  of '82,  New  York,  and  Mr.  Henry  H.  Hilton,  class  of  '90, 
Chicago,  together  with  Ex- Governor  Rollins,  to  act  with  the  com- 
mittee as  representing  New  Hampshire. 

Within  three  months  it  became  evident  that  the  sub- 
scriptions had  been  such  as  to  warrant  the  Trustees  in  mak- 
ing definite  plans  for  the  laying  of  the  corner-stone  of  the 
new  Dartmouth  Hall.  Arrangements,  therefore,  were 
undertaken  at  once,  looking  toward  a  suitable  celebration 
of  the  occasion. 

It  had  long  been  the  wish  of  the  Sixth  Earl  of  Dart- 
mouth, the  great-great-grandson  of  the  nobleman  whose 
name  the  College  perpetuates,  to  add  another  link  to  the 
chain  of  connection  between  "  Dartmouth  and  Dartmouth," 
the  first  link  of  which  had  been  so  strongly  forged  by  the 
Second  Earl  of  Dartmouth  and  President  Wheelock. 

The  present  Earl  is  a  thoroughly  equipped  historical 
student.    The  continuous  service  of  the  family  in  govern- 


INTRODUCTION  7 

ment  positions  has  led  to  the  accumulation  of  a  vast  num- 
ber of  valuable  manuscripts  at  Patshull  House.  Among 
these,  and  of  especial  interest  to  Americans,  are  the  papers 
and  correspondence  of  the  Second  Earl  while  Secretary  for 
the  Colonies,  1 772-1 775.  Lord  Dartmouth  is  at  present 
giving  much  time  to  the  supervision  of  the  collection 
of  manuscripts  in  the  family  archives.  Among  other 
reasons  for  his  desiring  to  come  to  Hanover,  Lord  Dart- 
mouth had  particularly  wished  to  present  in  person  valu- 
able manuscripts  to  the  College,  —  letters  sent  to  the 
Second  Earl  by  Eleazar  Wheelock,  by  John  Wheelock,  by 
John  Thornton,  with  others. 

The  Honorable  Charles  T.  Gallagher,  of  Boston,  who  had 
been  in  correspondence  with  the  Earl  on  other  matters, 
learned  that  he  would  consider  the  laying  of  the  corner- 
stone an  especially  happy  occasion  for  the  fulfilment  of  his 
desire  to  come  to  the  College  and  to  present  the  manu- 
scripts. The  College  on  its  side  felt  that  nothing  could  be 
so  appropriate  as  that  Lord  Dartmouth  should  be  present 
at  this  time  to  participate  in  such  an  event  as  was  to  occur. 
Plans  were  accordingly  made  for  the  laying  of  the  corner- 
stone, October  26,  1904,  and  for  other  exercises  celebrating 
the  visit  of  his  Lordship.  The  arrangements  were  com- 
pleted during  the  summer  in  a  visit  to  the  Earl  by  Melvin 
O.  Adams,  Esq.,  representing  the  College,  and  by  Mr. 
Lucius  Tuttle,  representing  the  Boston  and  Maine  Rail- 
road, which  extended  unceasing  courtesy  to  his  Lordship 
and  party  and  to  the  College.  Under  the  leadership  of  the 
President  of  the  College,  the  plans  for  the  celebration  were 
perfected.     Committees  were  appointed  as  follows  : 

General:   Professors    Charles    F.  Richardson,   D.    Collin 

Wells,  and  Louis  H.  Dow. 
Entertainment:  Professors  Harry  E.  Burton  and  Richard 

W.  Husband,  and  Mr.  Henry  N.  Teague. 


8  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

Transportation :   Professor  Frank  H.  Dixon  and  Mr.  Ernest 

M.  Hopkins. 
Decoration:   Professor  Gordon  F.  Hull  and  Mr.  Edgar  H. 

Hunter. 
Processions :   Professor  William  Patten  and  Colonel  Charles 

K.  Darling. 
Music:   Musical  Director  Charles  H.  Morse. 
Historical    Tableaux ^    Views,    and  Museum :    Professors 

Craven  Laycock,  Herbert  D.  Foster,  Frank  G.  Moore, 

Charles  A.  Holden,  and  George  D.  Lord ;  Mr.  Charles 

H.  Morse,  Mr.  Henry  N.  Sanborn,  and   Mr.  Fletcher 

Hale. 

The  week  marked  by  the  laying  of  the  corner-stone  and 
including  the  visit  of  the  Earl  of  Dartmouth  to  the  College 
bearing  the  name  of  his  ancestor,  was  significant  to  the 
academic  world  in  general,  but  to  the  College  itself  his 
coming  was  of  singular  interest.  Not  only  is  Dartmouth 
College  the  sole  American  institution  identified  with  a 
family  still  prominent  in  English  life ;  it  also  stands,  in  a 
peculiar  way,  for  the  history  of  early  attempts  to  edu- 
cate the  Indian.  From  Eleazar  Wheelock  to  the  Indian 
preacher  Occom,  from  Occom  to  George  Whitefield,  from 
Whitefield  to  the  Second  Earl  of  Dartmouth  and  the  rep- 
resentative of  King  George  III.,  who  gave  the  charter,  and 
from  the  earnest  band  of  English  religionists  who  helped 
the  "  small  college,"  to  those  dauntless  men  who  laid  its 
foundations  in  the  wilderness,  the  chain  is  complete. 

The  Earl,  upon  his  way  to  the  College,  made  a  brief 
visit  to  Boston.  He  was  met  there  by  men  of  the  Boston 
alumni,  and  throughout  his  stay  Dartmouth  men  acted  as 
hosts  to  him  and  his  party.  The  President  of  Harvard 
University  and  other  distinguished  men  of  Massachusetts 
assisted  informally  in  his  entertainment  and  added  pleasure 
to  those  days. 


John  Wentworth 

Governor  of  the  Royal  Province  of  New  Hampshire,  1 766-1 775 

Signer  of  the  Charter  of  Dartmouth  College 


Of  THE     '^     >V 

UNIVERSITY  ^ 

^         OF 


INTRODUCTION  9 

The  afternoon  of  Tuesday,  October  25,  was  fair  and 
warm,  and  Hanover  was  at  her  best  for  the  time  of  year. 
College  Hall  and  the  Hanover  Inn  were  tastefully  deco- 
rated with  bunting  and  flags,  —  the  Stars  and  Stripes  and 
the  Union  Jack  intertwined.  Over  the  Dartmouth  Hall 
site  was  an  electric  arch  bearing  the  words:  "  1791-Dart- 
mouth-1904." 

Lord  Dartmouth,  the  Countess  of  Dartmouth,  and  Lady 
Dorothy  Legge  arrived  by  carriage  early  in  the  afternoon 
from  West  Lebanon,  where  they  had  been  met  and  wel- 
comed in  behalf  of  the  general  committee  by  Professor 
Charles  F.  Richardson  and  Mrs.  Richardson,  with  others. 
The  arrival  at  the  Inn  was  greeted  by  enthusiastic  cheer- 
ing on  the  part  of  the  undergraduates,  who  were  massed 
on  the  portico  of  College  Hall,  and  by  the  ringing  of  the 
Chalmers  W.  Stevens  Peal  of  Bells  at  Rollins  Chapel.  The 
distinguished  guests  were  met  at  the  Inn  and  welcomed  to 
the  College  by  President  Tucker  and  Mrs.  Tucker. 

Soon  after  their  arrival,  the  members  of  the  Dartmouth 
party  were  escorted  to  the  Oval,  witnessing  there  a  game 
of  foot-ball  between  the  first  and  second  teams  of  the 
College.  It  was  the  first  touch  of  that  democratic  spirit 
which  marked  the  entire  visit  of  the  Earl.  At  six  o'clock 
Lord  Dartmouth  dined  with  the  student  body  at  College 
Hall.  In  the  midst  of  the  dinner,  the  electric  lights  sud- 
denly went  out,  leaving  the  room  for  a  few  moments  in 
total  darkness.  The  hearty  singing  of  college  songs  occu- 
pied the  time  until  the  lights  reappeared. 

At  eight  o'clock  the  Dramatic  Club  gave  a  series  of 
tableaux,  illustrating  the  history  of  the  College,  at  the 
Alumni  Oval.  A  covered  stage,  decorated  with  red,  white, 
and  blue  bunting,  the  College  green,  and  electric  lights, 
had  been  erected  opposite  the  grandstand.  The  grand- 
stand itself,  although  reserved  chiefly  for  the  guests  of  the 


10  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

College,  Trustees,  Alumni,  and  Faculty,  was  extended  by 
covered  seats  to  accommodate  the  entire  student  body. 
Heavy  strips  of  canvas  were  fastened  about  the  open  tops 
and  side  spaces  for  protection.  The  tableaux  were  as 
follows : 

Eleazar  Wheelock  receiving  Samson  Occom  at  Lebanon, 
Conn.,  December  6,  1743. 

Samson  Occom  preaching  in  Whitefield's  Tabernacle 
London,  February   16,  1766. 

The  first  Trustees'  Meeting,  Old  Wyman  Tavern,  Keene, 
N.  H.,  October  12,   1770. 

Wheelock  and  his  College  Family  at  Hanover,  1770. 

The  first  Commencement  of  Dartmouth  College,  Wednes- 
day, August  28,  1771. 

The  Return  of  Captain  John  Wheelock  and  his  Company 
after  Burgoyne's  surrender,  October,  1777. 

The  Fight  for  the  Library  against  the  '*  University " 
professors,   18 17. 

The  Refounding  of  Dartmouth  College :  The  Argument 
of  Daniel  Webster  before  the  Supreme  Court  at  Washing- 
ton, March  10,  1818. 

In  the  tableau  representing  Occom  preaching  in  White- 
field's  London  Tabernacle,  the  part  of  Occom  was  fitly 
taken  by  Dr.  Charles  A.  Eastman,  of  the  class  of  1887,  the 
last  Indian  graduate.  Between  the  tableaux  there  were 
singing  and  cheering  by  the  undergraduate  body,  under 
the  leadership  of  the  Glee  Club;  and  a  series  of  stereop- 
ticon  pictures,  illustrating  the  origins  of  the  College,  was 
presented.     These  consisted  of  the  following: 

Eleazar  Wheelock. 

Document  from  the  town  records  of  Windham,  Conn., 
showing  record  of  Wheelock's  birth  and  marriage. 

The  Village  Green  in  Columbia  (formerly  a  part  of  Leb- 
anon), Conn.,  with  site  of  Wheelock's  mansion-house. 


INTRODUCTION  1 1 

Village  Green,  Columbia,  from  site  of  Wheelock's  house. 

Village  Green,  Columbia,  with  site  of  Wheelock's  church. 

Burying  Ground,  Columbia,  on  land  granted  by  Wheelock. 

Elevation  of  Wheelock's  church  (begun  1747;  taken 
down  1832). 

Ground-plan  of  church. 

Attic  of  present  church  in  Columbia,  showing  rough- 
hewn  oak  timbers  from  Wheelock's  church. 

School-house  in  Columbia  in  1904  (the  building  used  by 
Wheelock  till  1770  for  his  Indian  school). 

War  office  of  Governor  Jonathan  Trumbull,  Lebanon, 
Conn. 

Governor  Jonathan  Trumbull  and  Madam  Trumbull. 

Samson  Occom. 

Occom's  house,  Mohegan,  Conn. 

George  Whitefield  preaching. 

Whitefield's  Tabernacle,  London,  opened  1753. 

Pulpit  in  the  Tabernacle,  representing  a  scene  during  the 
religious  riots  of  1756  (from  this  pulpit  Occom  preached 
during  his  stay  in  England). 

Whitefield's  chapel,  Tottenham  Court  Road,  London, 
opened  1756. 

Old  South  Church,  Newburyport,  Mass.,  where  White- 
field  is  buried. 

Interior  of  Church. 

Rev.  Nathaniel  Whitaker,  who  went  to  England  with 
Occom  to  raise  funds  for  the  College. 

The  Second  Earl  of  Dartmouth,  patron  of  the  College. 

The  Dartmouth  Arms. 

The  Dartmouth  Arms  with  all  the  quarterings. 

The  Washington  Arms. 

The  Sixth  Earl  of  Dartmouth. 

The  Countess  of  Dartmouth. 

Lady  Dorothy  Legge. 


12        DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

Patshull  House,  Wolverhampton,  England,  seat  of  the 
Earl  of  Dartmouth. 

The  old  Wyman  Tavern  in  Keene,  N.  H. 

Porch  of  the  tavern  to-day. 

Interior  of  the  tavern,  showing  room  in  which  first 
Trustees'  meeting  was  held. 

Peter  Oneida's  Primer. 

Governor  John  Wentworth. 

Bezaleel  Woodward. 

John  Phillips. 

John  Thornton. 

Samuel  Gray,  of  the  first  graduating  class,  1771. 

Stephen  Burroughs. 

Colonial  lottery-wheel. 

Dartmouth  College  lottery  ticket,  1784. 

Dartmouth  College  lottery  ticket,  1795. 

The  Old  Pine. 

Presidents  of  Dartmouth  College  :  Eleazar  Wheelock, 
John  Wheelock,  Francis  Brown,  Daniel  Dana,  Bennett 
Tyler,  Nathan  Lord,  Asa  Dodge  Smith,  Samuel  Colcord 
Bartlett,  William  Jewett  Tucker. 

Map  of  the  Village  of  Hanover  in  1775. 

First  framed  college  building. 

College  Hall  at  the  time  of  the  Revolution. 

Perspective  drawing  of  above  buildings. 

Dartmouth  College  in  1803,  drawn  by  George  Ticknor 
when  a  student. 

Dartmouth  Hall. 

John  B.  Wheeler  (whose  gift  permitted  the  Trustees  to 
begin  the  Dartmouth  College  Case). 

Jeremiah  Mason. 

Room  in  which  the  United  States  Supreme  Court  met 
in  1819. 

John  Marshall. 


INTRODUCTION  1 3 

Daniel  Webster. 

Motto  :  "  Founded  by  Eleazar  Wheelock ;  refounded  by 
Daniel  Webster." 

The  morning  of  Wednesday,  October  26th,  was  rainy, 
but  promptly  at  ten  o'clock  the  Trustees  and  Faculty  formed 
at  the  Hanover  Inn,  and  in  procession,  under  the  leader- 
ship of  Colonel  Charles  K.  Darling,  escorted  the  Dart- 
mouth party  to  the  College  Church.  The  guests  of  the 
College,  prominent  alumni,  trustees,  and  members  of  the 
faculty  had  seats  on  the  platform,  which  was  extended  for 
the  occasion.  Undergraduates  and  alumni  filled  the  body 
of  the  house,  and  the  galleries  were  reserved  for  ladies 
The  church  was  decorated  with  American  and  British  flags. 
Portraits  of  the  Second  Earl  of  Dartmouth  and  of  Eleazar 
Wheelock  were  on  either  side  of  the  platform.  President 
Tucker  presided  over  the  exercises,  which  were  as  follows  : 

Venite  in  D,  college  chorus,  Professor  Charles  H.  Morse, 
conductor. 

Prayer,  the  Reverend  Samuel  Penniman  Leeds,  D.D.  1870. 

Luther's  Hymn,  "  A  Mighty  Fortress  is  our  God." 

Introductory  Address,  President  Tucker. 

Historical  Address,  "The  Origins  of  Dartmouth  College," 
Professor  Francis  Brown,  D.D.  Dart.,  D.  Litt.  Oxon.,  of  the  class 
of  1870. 

Conferring  of  the  honorary  degree  of  Doctor  of  Laws  upon 
Lord  Dartmouth. 

Presentation  by  Lord  Dartmouth  of  the  correspondence  be- 
tween  Eleazar  Wheelock   and   the   Second   Earl  of  Dartmouth. 

Psalm  cxxxvi,  sung  by  alumni  and  students. 

Benediction,  the  Reverend  Frederick  D.  Avery,  Pastor  Emeritus 
of  the  Congregational  Church  at  Columbia,  formerly  Lebanon, 
Conn. 

Continued  rain  somewhat  altered  the  original  plans  for 
the  afternoon,  and  the  first  of  the  corner-stone  exercises 
were  accordingly  held  in  the  Church,  instead  of  at  the 


14  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

Dartmouth  Hall  site,  as  was  at  first  intended.  The  Hon- 
orable Samuel  L.  Powers,  '74>  presided  in  the  absence  of 
Mr.  Henry  D.  Pierce,'72,  President'of  the  Dartmouth  Alumni 
Association.  After  music  by  the  College  chorus  Charles 
F.  Mathewson,  Esq.,  '82,  gave  an  address,  followed  by  the 
reading  of  an  ode  by  Mr.  Wilder  D.  Quint,  of  the  class  of  '8y. 
"  Men  of  Dartmouth,"  words  by  Richard  Hovey,  '85,  music 
by  Louis  P.  Benezet,  '99,  was  sung  by  the  chorus ;  and 
Lord  Dartmouth  made  a  brief  address.  At  the  close  of 
these  exercises  the  procession  marched  to  Eleazar  Whee- 
lock's  grave,  where  President  Tucker  paid  a  tribute  to  the 
founder  and  first  president  of  the  College,  and  touched 
upon  the  underlying  significance  of  the  week,  when  he 
said :  "  The  gift  of  the  eighteenth  century  to  the  colleges 
of  America  was  the  gift  of  the  religious  spirit."  From  the 
cemetery  the  procession  marched  to  the  corner-stone  of 
Dartmouth  Hall,  where  the  dedicatory  prayer  was  offered 
by  Bishop  Ethelbert  Talbot,  'yo.  Lord  Dartmouth,  taking 
the  trowel  from  the  presiding  officer  and  placing  the  mortar 
about  the  stone,  said :  "  And  now  in  the  name  of  the 
Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Ghost  I  declare  this  corner-stone 
well  and  duly  laid.  Floreat  et  haec  nostra  donius  esto  per- 
petual    The  peal  of  bells  concluded  the  ceremony. 

The  contents  of  the  corner-stone  are  as  follows :  Dart- 
mouth College  Catalogue,  1903-1904;  General  Catalogue 
of  Dartmouth  College  and  the  Associated  Schools,  1900; 
Dartmouth  College  Directory,  1904- 1905  ;  The  Proceedings 
of  the  Webster  Centennial  of  Dartmouth  College,  1901 ; 
The  Dartmouth,  October  21,  1904:  The  Aegis  of  the  class 
of  1905  ;  The  Dartmouth  Magazine,  May,  1904;  estimate 
of  the  college  plant,  October,  1904. 

The  formal  exercises  of  the  week  were  brought  to  a  close 
Wednesday  evening,  when  the  President  and  Trustees 
tendered  a  banquet  to  Lord  Dartmouth  in  College  Hall. 


o   « 

u 

X 


INTRODUCTION  1 5 

The  dining-room  was  elaborately  decorated  with  American 
and  British  flags  and  with  pictures  of  prominent  alumni 
and  of  Old  Dartmouth  Hall  ;  while  the  tables  were  strewn 
with  autumn  leaves  tied  on  streamers  of  red  ribbon.  At 
the  head  of  the  table  sat  President  Tucker,  Lord  Dart- 
mouth, Governor  Nahum  J.  Bachelder,  President  Charles 
William  Eliot,  of  Harvard  University,  President  Lyon 
Gardiner  Tyler,  of  William  and  Mary  College,  Dr.  Charles 
Alexander  Eastman,  'd)^^  the  Honorable  Charles  T.  Gal- 
lagher, A.M.  '94,  and  the  Honorable  Elihu  Root,  represent- 
ing Hamilton  College.  A  letter  of  congratulation  was  read 
from  President  Arthur  T.  Hadley,  of  Yale  University. 

Those  colleges  which,  from  age,  or  like  English  origin, 
or  association  in  the  first  movements  for  the  education  of 
the  Indians,  had  a  natural  interest  in  the  early  history  of 
the  College,  were  represented  at  the  banquet. 

Thursday  evening,  October  27,  the  students  built  a  great 
bonfire  on  the  campus,  in  honor  of  Lord  Dartmouth,  who, 
with  Mr.  Gallagher,  appeared  and  mingled  with  them  in  a 
very  informal  manner.  After  a  parade  about  the  fire  the 
marchers  grouped  around  the  Senior  fence,  from  which 
Lord  Dartmouth  made  a  short  speech  to  the  effect  that 
while  he  appreciated  beyond  measure  the  degree  which  he 
had  received  from  the  College,  still  his  greatest  enjoyment 
would  lie  in  his  membership  in  the  College  through  having 
been  received  so  kindly  into  the  fellowship  of  the  student 
body  and  thus  having  become  in  the  truest  way  a  Dartmouth 
man. 

When,  next  morning.  Lord  Dartmouth  took  his  departure 
from  Hanover,  the  Faculty  and  throngs  of  cheering  stu- 
dents felt  that  they  had  come  to  know  a  man  and  a  friend, 
who  was,  in  his  own  happy  words,  but  going  back  from 
Dartmouth  to  Dartmouth,  between  which  there  had  never 
been  a  break  for  a  hundred  and  thirty-five  years. 


WEDNESDAY   MORNING 


INTRODUCTORY   ADDRESS 

By  the  president  OF  THE  COLLEGE 
Gentlemen  of  the  College: 

y4  S  we  came  together  three  years  ago  to  take  note  of 
yLA  the  centennial  of  Mr.  Webster's  graduation  I  re- 
^  -^  marked,  in  introducing  the  exercises  of  the  occa- 
sion, that  we  did  not  wish  ''to  prejudice  an  observance 
by  the  College  some  years  hence  of  a  strictly  academic 
event  or  combination  of  events.  The  year  1919"  —  I 
added  —  "  will  be  the  one  hundred  and  fiftieth  anniversary 
of  the  signing  of  the  charter  of  the  College,  and  the  one 
hundredth  anniversary  of  the  decision  in  the  Dartmouth 
College  case.  We  leave,  therefore,  to  our  successors  the 
honor  of  observing  that  year  as  a  great  academic  occa- 
sion—  the  year  which  by  a  striking  coincidence  holds 
the  dates  which  measure  in  appreciable  terms  the  found- 
ing and  the  refounding  of  the  College." 

No  one  could  have  foreseen  at  that  time  the  costly 
experience  through  which  we  were  to  pass,  which  brings 
us  together  again,  in  the  circumstance  of  to-day.  But 
what  was  said  of  that  former  occasion  may  be  said  with 
equal  fitness  of  the  present  occasion.  Neither  one  has 
been  accounted  by  us  as  a  great  academic  observance, 
to  be  so  recognized  by  convening  our  wide  academic 
fellowship,  and  to  be  celebrated  with  academic  splendor. 
The  Webster  Centennial  and  the  Laying  of  the  Corner- 
stone of  the  new  Dartmouth  Hall  mean  very  much  to 
us  —  they  are  great  domestic  events  —  but  we  have  not 


20        DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

wished  to  exaggerate  the  meaning  of  these  events  to 
others.  And  therefore,  as  at  the  Webster  Centennial 
we  invited  only  the  representatives  of  the  State  and 
National  Governments,  so  now  we  have  asked  only  for 
a  representation  from  that  group  of  colleges  with  which 
Dartmouth  was  identified  in  its  early  history,  —  Harvard, 
whose  primacy  in  the  educational  life  of  the  country 
makes  its  presence  always  and  everywhere  necessary ; 
William  and  Mary,  the  first  of  American  colleges  to 
transfer  great  English  names  to  our  institutions  ;  Yale, 
alma  mater  of  Eleazar  Wheelock,  mother  of  Dartmouth ; 
and  Hamilton,  founded  by  Samuel  Kirkland,  pupil  of 
Eleazar  Wheelock  and  co-worker  with  him  in  the  educa- 
tion of  the  Indians.  Harvard,  William  and  Mary,  and 
Yale  will  be  represented  during  these  exercises  by  their 
honored  presidents;   Hamilton  by  Mr.  Root. 

The  present  occasion  finds  its  unusual  distinction  in 
the  timely  visit  of  one  who  in  his  own  person  reminds  us 
of  our  academic  kinship  and  of  the  honor  of  our  name,  — 
the  Earl  of  Dartmouth. 

The  chief  significance  to  us  of  the  exercises  attending 
the  laying  of  the  corner-stone  of  the  New  Dartmouth 
Hall  is  that  they  bring  us  face  to  face  with  the  origins 
of  the  College, — origins  various,  diverse,  even  contra- 
dictory, but  whether  studied  at  the  different  sources  or  in 
the  process  through  which  they  slowly  converged  and  com- 
bined toward  the  final  end,  profoundly  interesting.  The  sub- 
ject of  the  morning  is,  The  Origins  of  Dartmouth  College. 

Of  all  the  graduates  of  Dartmouth,  I  know  of  no  one 
who  by  academic  descent,  or  by  familiarity  with  English 
associations,  or  by  right  of  his  own  broad  and  unerring 
scholarship,  is  so  well  fitted  to  treat  this  subject  as  the 
historian  and  orator  of  the  hour,  whom  I  now  present 
to  you,  —  Francis  Brown,  of  the  class  of  1870. 


THE   ORIGINS   OF   DARTMOUTH 
COLLEGE 

By  professor  FRANCIS   BROWN,  D.D.,  D.  Litt. 

Mr.  President,   Your  Excellency,  Honored  Guests,  Brothers,  and 
Friends  of  Dartmouth  College : 

FOR  seven  hundred  years  our  western  world  has 
accustomed  itself  to  endowments  for  teaching  as 
the  expression  of  intellectual  life.  The  revival 
of  learning  was  not  mere  increase  of  knowledge,  it  was 
also  a  quickening,  an  expansion  of  mind,  a  sense  of  the 
glory  of  knowledge  —  its  serious  splendor  —  and  a  passion 
for  the  spread  of  it.  Monkishness  broke  down,  —  monkish 
learning,  like  monkish  hfe.  Facts  multiplied ;  raen*s 
thought  was  unchained  and  worked  freely  over  them,  and 
those  who  knew  felt  the  impulse  to  tell.  Learners  crowded 
to  the  great  teachers,  and  universities  sprang  up  like  trees 
whose  life  takes  on  its  own  form. 

Later  foundations  have  been  less  spontaneous.  Creative 
ages  are  few,  and,  after  the  first,  most  educational  struc- 
tures have,  of  necessity,  been  planned  and  framed, — built 
as  houses  for  the  mind  to  grow  up  in,  and  workshops  for 
its  product. 

Those  that  began,  either  way,  in  generations  before  ours, 
have  the  priceless  advantage  of  a  history.  History  means 
inheritance,  old  lessons  and  habits  handed  down,  expe- 
rience, reverence,  mellowness.  The  freight  of  a  hundred 
and  fifty  years   is   only  less   precious  than    that  of   five 


22  DARTMOUTH   HALL   CORNER-STONE 

hundred.  We  are  reminded  once  more,  to-day,  of  the  rich 
past  we  carry  with  us  into  the  eager  years. 

Dartmouth  College  began  simply  and  modestly  enough, 
but  it  had  one  distinction,  linking  it  in  an  uncommon  way 
with  the  ancient  foundations  of  Europe.  It  was  born  un- 
conscious of  its  future.  It  developed  stage  by  stage  as 
the  living  expression  of  a  strong  and  ardent  and  growing 
man. 

Its  charter  was  eighth,  in  order,  of  the  colleges  planted 
among  the  English  colonists  in  America — the  last  but 
one  before  the  War  of  Independence  —  but  its  charter  and 
name  and  change  of  place  only  marked  a  definite  stage 
in  the  process  of  its  life,  the  setting  of  the  bud  that  was 
to  open;  the  stalk  was  already  above  ground,  —  straight 
and  full  of  sap. 

Harvard^  the  mother,  or  grandmother,  of  us  all,  was 
founded,  by  a  vote  of  the  General  Court  of  Massachusetts, 
in  1636;  even  those  of  us  know  this  who  have  forgotten 
the  name  of  Harvard's  first  president. 

William  and  Mary  received  its  charter  from  its  patron 
sovereigns  in  1693  at  the  urgent  petition  of  the  people  of 
the  Colony  of  Virginia,  when  the  purpose  to  have  a  college 
was  already  almost  seventy-five  years  old,  and  repeated 
attempts  had  been  made. 

Yale^  the  first  intellectual  child  of  Harvard  by  direct 
descent,  was  planned  by  Connecticut  ministers  and  char- 
tered in  1 701,  as  a  colonial  movement. 

Yale  and  Harvard  together  produced  "  New  Jersey  Col- 
lege "  at  Princeton,  organized  with  definite  purpose  from 
the  first.     It  received  its  charter  in  1746. 

King's,  also,  was  founded  after  long  endeavor,  and,  like 
Princeton,  drew  on  Connecticut  for  its  first  President. 
This  very  week,  under  the  name  "  Columbia,"  already  a 
hundred  and  twenty  years  old,  it  begins  the  celebration  of 


THE  ORIGINS   OF  DARTMOUTH   COLLEGE  23 

its  sesquicentennial.     Its  royal  charter  was  dated  October 
3h  1754. 

Then  the  colleges  pressed  more  thickly.  Rhode  Island 
College  was  incorporated  by  the  General  Assembly  of  that 
colony  in  1754,  in  accordance  with  the  request  of  the  Phil- 
adelphia Association  of  Baptists ;  this  year  it  observes  the 
centenary  of  the  change  to  the  present  name  of  Brown 
University. 

The  University  of  Pennsylvania  was  chartered  in  1755, 
on  the  foundation  of  Franklin's  Academy,  which  was  two 
years  older. 

Then  followed  Dartmouth' s  incorporation  in  December, 
1769,  and  on  the  heels  of  it  that  of  Rutgers  in  March,  1770, 
to  meet  the  needs  of  the  Dutch  Reformed  Church,  especially 
in  New  Jersey.  Technically,  Rutgers  should  perhaps  pre- 
cede Dartmouth,  as  a  prior  charter  seems  to  have  been 
granted  in  1766,  but  this,  for  some  reason,  was  ineffective. 

Most  of  these  origins  attest  the  value  set  on  education 
by  groups  of  men  who  had  the  conscious  and  worthy  pur- 
pose of  putting  Christian  education  within  the  reach  of  their 
own  sons.  We  do  not  find  the  heart  of  any  other  one  of 
these  enterprises,  at  its  beginning,  to  have  been  a  personality 
which  for  twenty-five  years  was  the  essence  of  the  whole, 
as  Wheelock  was  the  heart  and  brains  of  Dartmouth. 
Hamilton  College  was  in  some  degree  a  later  parallel. 

Eleazar  Wheelock  was  born  at  Windham,  in  Con- 
necticut, in  April,  171 1 ;  lived  his  life  within  the  limits  of 
New  England  and  New  York,  and  died  here  in  Hanover 
in  1779.  But  he  was  far  from  being  a  mere  provincial. 
His  characteristics  were  those  of  an  Englishman  —  a 
rather  unusual  one  —  modified  by  the  life  of  a  pioneer. 
Perhaps  his  mental  gifts  showed  his  ancestry ;  his  great- 
grandfather, a  Shropshire  minister,  who  came  over  to 
Dedham  in  1637,  when  Harvard  was  a  year  old,  had  been 


24  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

a  Cambridge  man.  Certainly  he  was  gifted  in  mind.  He 
graduated  from  Yale  in  1733,  and  divided  with  Pomeroy  — 
later  his  brother-in-law — Berkeley's  scholarship  for  gradu- 
ate study  at  its  first  award;  it  was  conditioned  on  the 
highest  rank  in  the  classics.  But  he  was  not  a  book- 
worm ;  his  mind  was  spacious,  full  of  large  ideas,  imagina- 
tive, vivid,  and  yet  exact  and  practical  in  common  details ; 
logical,  argumentative,  and  adroit.  His  correspondence  was 
wide  and  his  thought  still  wider.  As  a  quiet  scholar  — 
though  he  might  have  grown  distinguished  —  only  half  of 
him  would  have  come  to  expression ;  he  had  the  capacity 
for  affairs. 

Intellectual  vigor  was  backed  in  him  by  tenacity  of  pur- 
pose and  an  indomitable  will.  He  dealt  with  the  highest 
relations  of  man,  and  was  heart  and  soul  in  this  work.  If 
he  had  ambitions  they  were  such  as  fell  in  with  eager  plans 
of  service.  He  was  autocratic  as  a  field-marshal,  with  a 
field-marshal's  power  of  organizing,  eye  for  the  strategic, 
skill  in  manceuvering,  directness  of  purpose.  He  assumed 
burdens  and  faced  hardships  without  hesitating;  he  held 
his  own  against  critics  and  opponents  and  did  not  flinch, 
never  waiting  for  other  people's  courage,  but  giving  his  to 
them.  He  was  a  lion-hearted  man,  and  a  lion  has  the 
impulse  to  dominate.  Has  it  ever  seemed  to  any  one  that 
he  sometimes  overstepped  fair  limits  in  identifying  his 
enterprise  with  the  Kingdom  of  God  ?  The  world  would 
surely  not  be  poorer  if  more  of  us  magnified  our  doings 
by  viewing  them  thus  sub  specie  aeternitatis.  With  it  all 
he  had  much  skill  in  handling  men,  much  instinctive  tact, 
much  self-control  and  patience.  He  took  small  account  of 
bodily  fatigue  and  ill,  but  worked  hard  to  the  end;  and 
into  his  labors  we  have  entered,  —  let  us  hope  not  too 
ungratefully. 

His  life  has  been  written  for  us  more  than  once ;  last 


Eleazar  Wheelock 
Founder  and  first  President  of  Dartmouth  College 


r 


THE  ORIGINS   OF  DARTMOUTH   COLLEGE  25 

and  best  by  the  hand  of  a  born  historian,  who  had  studied 
all  the  materials  for  it  with  loving  perseverance  and 
trained  judgment.  If  that  historian  were  alive  it  would  be 
his  natural  office  to  address  you  to-day.  His  work  makes 
a  sketch  like  this  essentially  superfluous,  but,  since  the 
occasion  seems  to  demand  some  speaker,  the  least  the 
speaker  can  do  is  to  acknowledge  his  indebtedness  to 
Frederick  Chase. 

We  know  well  the  main  facts  in  point :  Mr.  Wheelock 
became  pastor  of  a  church  in  what  was  then  Lebanon, 
Connecticut,  in  1735.  Need  led  him  to  follow  a  common 
usage,  in  gathering  about  himself  boys  in  preparation  for 
college,  and  teaching  them  for  pay,  —  a  distant  and  no 
doubt  almost  comical  parallel  to  the  flocking  of  thirsty 
minds  to  Paris  or  Oxford,  when  Abelard  and  Vacarius 
were  lecturing  there.  They  flocked  eagerly  of  their  own 
accord.  The  boys  Wheelock  set  his  heart  on  had  to  be 
constrained  to  come.  But,  one  way  or  the  other,  the 
drawing  power  was  Wheelock.  And  perhaps  Occom  and 
Kirkland,  and  even  Brant,  will  be  as  well  worth  pointing  to 
in  the  day  of  judgment  as  any  incipient  philosopher  of  the 
twelfth  or  thirteenth  century.  And  Wheelock  must  have 
been  a  successful  teacher,  for  his  class  grew  into  a  school. 
Occom,  a  Mohegan  Indian,  was  received  into  this  school  in 
December,  1743;  he  left  in  March,  1748;  for  the  time  he 
had  no  successor.  Wheelock's  distinct  work  for  Indians, 
as  such,  did  not  begin  till  1754. 

In  1754  white  settlements  still  rested  on  the  western 
border  of  this  continent  like  the  palms  of  hands  reaching 
over  from  Europe,  with  a  few  lines  of  penetration  into  the 
wilderness  behind,  as  of  slender  and  none  too  powerful 
fingers.  One  long  French  finger  traced  out  the  St. 
Lawrence,  and  crooked  down  the  Mississippi  valley  to 
meet  another  French  finger  beginning  to  creep  up  north- 


26        DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

ward  from  New  Orleans.  The  purpose  was  to  lock  fingers 
with  a  wrestler's  grip  about  the  territory  of  the  English 
colonists,  and  secure  the  new  world  for  France.  Quebec 
had  not  fallen  ;  Napoleon  was  not  born,  and  the  Louisiana 
Purchase  was  undreamed  of.  Most  of  the  space  between 
the  settlements  was  the  range  of  savage  Indians,  whose 
villages  held  them  only  till  greed  or  revenge  sent  them  to 
the  warpath.  There  were  a  few  quiet  groups  of  Indians  in 
New  England,  semi-civilized,  —  the  Mohegan  stock  near 
New  London,  the  Stockbridge  group,  the  Narragansetts, 
and  the  Montauks,  with  other  remnants  of  the  Algonquin 
race.  In  the  north,  toward  Canada,  wild  Indians  still 
roamed  the  woods,  English  colonists  along  the  Mohawk 
were  in  close  touch  with  the  fierce  Iroquois,  and  in  other 
parts  other  tribes  claimed  prior  rights  of  possession, — 
more  or  less  massive  and  formidable,  none  very  numerous, 
but  mobile  to  the  last  degree. 

The  French  had  always  stood  better  with  the  Indians 
than  the  English  had,  being  readier  at  conciliation ;  the 
Jesuits  had  done  their  work,  and  Frontenac,  La  Salle,  and 
Marquette  theirs.  In  New  York  and  in  Pennsylvania 
fear  of  the  French  and  fear  of  the  Indians  were  not  far 
apart.  The  premonitory  frictions  were  felt  which  started 
the  flame  of  open  hostilities  in  1755,  and  the  Indians  bore  a 
savage  part  in  the  fightings  of  the  next  six  years. 

Political  wisdom,  therefore,  dictated  attempts  to  civilize 
the  Indians  and  attach  them  to  the  English  side,  and  here 
of  course  Sir  William  Johnson  showed  the  way.  Wheelock 
saw  its  importance,  and  when  he  emphasizes  it  in  writing 
to  those  to  whom  it  would  appeal  he  is  not  an  opportunist, 
using  any  and  every  available  argument  to  gain  his  point, 
but  a  serious  man,  all  English  in  his  convictions,  express- 
ing himself  on  vital  problems  of  his  day.  He  began  not 
only  to  see,  but  to  feel,  to  be  possessed  by,  the  need  of 


THE  ORIGINS   OF  DARTMOUTH  COLLEGE  2^ 

trying  to  create  among  these  perilous  folk  a  civilization 
that  should  be  maintained  by  educated  men,  and  have  the 
sanction  and  the  loyalties  of  religion  at  its  base. 

But  this  was  not  all,  nor  even  the  main  thing.  The 
Christian  imagination  was  stirred  at  the  thought  of  pagans 
at  one's  very  doors,  at  the  possibility  of  converting  whole 
nations  without  crossing  a  single  ocean.  It  was  the  oppor- 
tunity of  St.  Boniface  over  again. 

Of  course,  Wheelock  was  not  original,  nor  alone  in  this. 
John  Eliot  had  preached  to  the  Indians  more  than  a  cen- 
tury before,  and  there  were  missionaries  among  them  in 
Wheelock's  time.  Yet  he  came  to  feel  deeply  that  his 
service  consisted  in  getting  them  to  come  to  him  and  be 
taught,  so  as  to  gain  at  least  enough  learning  and  reli- 
gion to  become  teachers  themselves.  Here,  too,  he  had 
had  notable  anticipations.  In  1619  —  the  year  before 
Plymouth  Rock  felt  a  white  man's  foot — a  grant  of  1,000 
acres  had  been  made  by  the  Virginia  Company  for  an 
Indian  College,  and  in  the  same  year  the  bishops  of  Eng- 
land, at  the  King's  suggestion,  raised  ;£"i,500  for  Indian 
education.  One  motive  of  the  Colonial  Assembly  of  Vir- 
ginia, when  in  1691  it  asked  for  royal  endowment  of  Wil- 
liam and  Mary  College,  was  '*  that  the  Christian  faith  may 
be  propagated  among  the  Western  Indians."  We  are  told 
that  "  at  one  time,  during  Governor  Spottiswoode's  regime  " 
(I  am  quoting  from  Professor  Herbert  Adams's  "  Circulars 
of  Information  of  the  Bureau  of  Education,"  No.  i,  March 
4,  1887),  "there  were  nearly  twenty  Indian  students  at 
William  and  Mary  College.  The  governor  remitted  the 
tribute  of  peltry  formerly  exacted  from  certain  tribes,  on 
condition  that  they  should  send  the  children  of  the  *  chief 
men'  to  Williamsburg  to  be  educated," — the  very  ones 
Wheelock  wanted  in  his  time.  '*  Juvenile  hostages  were 
also  taken  from  hostile  tribes  for  the  same  purpose,  which 


28  DARTMOUTH   HALL   CORNER-STONE 

served  also  to  promote  the  salus publica''  (p.  i6).  Whee- 
lock's  letters  show  —  even  more  explicitly  —  the  same 
point  of  view.  To  Sir  William  Johnson  he  wrote :  ^  "  We 
have  been  persuaded  that  the  education  of  some  of  their 
sons  in  the  liberal  arts  and  sciences,  as  well  as  in  the 
knowledge  and  practice  of  the  protestant  religion,  and 
the  fitting  of  some  for  missionaries  among  their  respec- 
tive tribes,  might  have  a  happy  effect  to  guard  them 
against  the  influence  of  Jesuits;  be  an  antidote  to  their 
idolatrous  and  savage  practices  ;  attach  them  to  English 
interest,  and  induce  them  to  a  cordial  subjection  to  the 
crown  of  Britain,  and  it  is  to  be  hoped  to  a  subjection  to 
the  King  of  Zion."  (The  close  is  not  professional,  or  con- 
ventional, but  perfectly  natural  and  sincere.)  He  wrote 
to  Lord  Dartmouth :  ^  "  The  Nations  [i.  e.  the  Iroquois] 
will  not  make  war  with  us  while  their  children,  and  espe- 
cially the  children  of  their  chiefs,  are  with  us  —  They  can't 
resist  the  evidence  we  hereby  give  them  of  the  sincerity 
of  our  Intentions  towards  them." 

Probably  Wheelock  knew  of  the  Virginian  example.^ 
The  Librarian  of  this  College  pointed  out  a  few  years 
ago  *  that  Wheelock  really  undertook  to  do  on  the  main- 
land what  Berkeley  had  designed  for  Bermuda,  and  that 
Wheelock  had  been  Berkeley's  beneficiary  at  Yale;  and 
he  raised  the  question  whether  this  might  not  be  some- 
thing more  than  a  coincidence.  If  so,  it  would  mean  a 
good  Irish  strain  in  the  pedigree  of  the  College.  In  any 
case,  such  things  were  in  the  air.  Wheelock's  plan  was 
to  bring  Indians  to  his  school  —  not,  like  Sargeant,  to 

1  June  1761 ;  see  McClure,  Life  of  Wheelock,  p.  227. 

2  September  4,  1766;  Dart.  MSS.  ii,  49. 

*  And  of  the  like  purpose  of  Harvard,  to  which  President  Eliot  has 
called  attention. 

*  See  the  General  Catalogue,  1900,  p.  25. 


THE  ORIGINS   OF  DARTMOUTH   COLLEGE  29 

plant  a  school  among  them  —  in  order  to  get  a  better  and 
longer  chance  at  them,  associate  them  closely  with  youth 
of  the  colonies,  and  send  out  his  scholars,  both  white  and 
red,  to  multiply  schools  and  churches  on  Indian  ground. 
It  was  not  easy  to  get  the  Indians  to  come,  but  it  was  pos- 
sible (in  1762  there  were  more  than  twenty). 

There  were  other  difficulties  which  gave  him  more  anx- 
iety. Chief  of  these  were  the  difficulty  of  supporting  them 
and  their  teachers  when  they  came,  and  that  of  such  or- 
ganization as  would  divide  the  burden  of  responsibility, 
gain  public  confidence  and  secure  a  permanent  life  to  the 
school,  —  the  two  questions  of  money  and  incorporation. 
These  were  closely  related,  but  the  question  of  money  was 
the  more  pressing.  Private  subscriptions  were  obtained. 
Joshua  More,  of  Mansfield,  bought  a  house  with  land  next 
to  Wheelock's  at  Lebanon  in  1755,  and  conveyed  it  to  a 
group  of  five  men,  including  Wheelock,  for  the  use  of  the 
school.  For  a  time  the  school  was  known  by  More's  name, 
but  this  fell  into  disuse.  More  died  the  next  year,  and  the 
group  of  five,  lacking  incorporation,  proved  incapable  of  tak- 
ing legal  title.  Accordingly  More's  widow,  Dorothy,  faithful 
woman  that  she  was,  executed  in  1763  ^  a  new  deed,  con- 
veying the  property  to  Wheelock  personally,  for  the  school. 
Some  public  collections  were  made.  The  Provincial 
Assembly  of  Massachusetts  was  induced  to  make  a  few 
annual  appropriations  (1761-68)  out  of  the  fund  left  to  the 
province  by  Sir  Peter  Warren  (Sir  William  Johnson's 
uncle)  for  Indian  education.  The  New  Hampshire  As- 
sembly gave  £^0  in  1763.  But  the  income  was  still  un- 
certain and  meagre.  Public  moneys  were  sparingly  given 
and  private  friends  had  little  to  give.     Harvard  had  begun 

1  Chase,  Hist,  of  Dart.  ColL  16,  says  1758,  but  see  the  deed, 
now  in  possession  of  the  College  (Havemeyer  Coll.,  received  through 
Dr.  Charles  E.  Quimby). 


30  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

as  a  public  foundation,  with  the  credit  of  the  colony  be- 
hind it,  never,  indeed,  extravagantly  drawn  upon.  Yale 
had  the  Assembly's  recognition.  King's  and  Pennsyl- 
vania had  rich  friends,  and  King's  was  favored  by  public 
lotteries  (our  lotteries  came  up  under  another  regime). 
William  and  Mary  had  a  royal  grant  of  ;£"2,ooo  and  20,000 
acres  of  land,  with  an  export  tax  on  tobacco  of  id.  the 
pound,  and  the  fees  and  profits  of  land-surveying.  From 
the  House  of  Burgesses  it  had  an  export  duty  on  skins  and 
furs,  and  from  time  to  time  a  tax  on  imported  liquors,  a 
tax  on  peddlers,  and  various  special  appropriations.  These 
gifts  were  highly  creditable  to  the  authorities  that  gave 
them,  and  were  far  from  excessive.  But  Wheelock  had 
no  such  recourse.  It  was  natural  to  look  eastward  over 
the  sea  for  aid,  as  the  younger  community  to  the  older 
and  the  parent  stock.  Indeed,  the  older  had  already  come 
westward,  as  if  anticipating  the  need.  Two  British  mis- 
sion societies  had  their  Boards  of  Correspondents  in 
Boston :  "  The  Society  for  the  Propagation  of  the  Gos- 
pel in  Foreign  Parts,"  Anglican,  founded  in  1701,  with 
headquarters  in  London,  and  "  The  Society  in  Scotland 
for  Propagating  Christian  Knowledge,"  founded  in  1709, 
with  offices  in  Edinburgh.  Small  allowances  for  Whee- 
lock's  school  were  secured  from  the  London  society 
through  its  Boston  board  from  1756  to  1767,  and  some 
aid  came,  more  irregularly,  from  the  Scotch  society,  in 
1 76 1,  and  later,  through  its  Boston  board  —  where  per- 
sonal prejudice,  arising  mainly  from  theological  and  reli- 
gious differences,  caused  interruption  afterward  —  and 
also  through  a  like  board  of  the  Scotch  society  in  New 
York.  But  the  agency  of  Whitefield  was  by  far  the  most 
helpful  of  all.  George  Whitefield  was  at  this  time  the 
most  active  missionary  force  on  the  Atlantic  coast.  He 
came  to  New  England  first  in  1740,  and  then  Wheelock 


THE  ORIGINS   OF  DARTMOUTH  COLLEGE  3 1 

probably  met  him.  Both  were  active  in  the  religious 
movement  which  stirred  New  England  in  those  years, 
side  by  side  with  the  evangelical  revival  in  England, — 
the  movement  known  in  New  England  history  as  "  The 
Great  Awakening."  Whitefield  was  a  powerful  agent  in 
it.  He  was  an  Oxford  man,  of  Pembroke,  yet  his  strength 
lay  not  in  scholarship  but  in  the  extraordinary  gifts  of  a 
natural  orator,  and  the  fire  of  enthusiasm  which  blazed 
out  through  these.  He  had  a  strong  will  and  great  power 
of  persuasion.  His  advocacy  of  any  cause  was  prevailing, 
because  he  never  apologized  for  it.  The  plan  of  an  Indian 
school,  with  missionary  purpose,  appealed  to  such  a  man, 
of  course.  Whitefield  advanced  Wheelock's  plan  with 
ardor.  He  gathered  money  for  it  in  New  York,  Phila- 
delphia, and  elsewhere.  He  secured  the  interest  of  gen- 
erous persons  in  Great  Britain,  —  ;^$o  came  from  the 
Marquis  of  Lothian  in  1760,  ;^20  from  Mr.  Charles  Hardy 
in  1761,  ;^20  from  Mr.  Samuel  Savage  in  1762,  and  there 
were  other  sums,  many  of  them  repeated  over  and  over 
again.  In  1764  the  Earl  of  Stirling  headed  a  subscription. 
Whitefield's  influence  had  opened  the  door  for  Wheelock 
in  New  Hampshire,  and  underlay  the  favorable  action  of 
the  Scotch  Society  in  1764,  on  a  proposal  from  Wheelock 
that  a  Board  of  Correspondents  be  named  in  Connecticut ; 
this  action  was  very  useful  to  the  school.  These  things 
illustrate  Mr.  Chase's  meaning  when  he  says  that  "White- 
field —  though  far  from  intending  it  —  was  actually  the 
most  important  agent  in  establishing  the  College  "  (p.  4). 

But  Whitefield's  greatest  service  to  the  school  is  yet  to 
be  named.  In  1760  he  had  proposed  sending  to  England 
a  converted  Indian  scholar,  as  a  proof  of  the  work  and  a 
visible  appeal  for  its  support.  In  1765  this  was  actually 
done.  Samson  Occom  was  sent,  and  the  Reverend  Nathan- 
iel Whitaker  with  him.    Whitefield  prepared  the  ground 


32  DARTMOUTH   HALL  CORNER-STONE 

for  them,  introduced  them  when  they  arrived,  and  started 
them  on  their  campaign  of  more  than  two  years. 

A  British  collection  for  an  American  college  was  not  a 
new  idea.  Princeton,  King's,  Rhode  Island  College,  and 
the'  University  of  Pennsylvania  had  tried  it  with  success. 
The  Provost  of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania  had  gone 
over  for  this  purpose  in  1762,  and  received  a  *'  brief"  from 
the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  authorizing  collections  in 
the  churches.  King's  College  had  successful  agents  in 
England  in  1763.  Whitaker  and  Occom  found  Morgan 
Edwards  soliciting  money  in  Ireland  for  Rhode  Island 
College,  and  refrained  therefore  from  going  to  Ireland 
themselves.  If  it  seems  to  us  that  Great  Britain  was  ex- 
cessively worked  in  the  philanthropic  interest,  we  must 
remember  that  its  wealth  was  out  of  all  proportion  greater 
than  that  of  the  colonies,  that  regular  channels  of  benevo- 
lence were  comparatively  few,  and  that  the  different  enter- 
prises appealed  in  part  to  different  sets  of  people.  But 
this  does  not  lessen  the  impression  of  generous  response 
to  these  many  embassies  of  good  works. 

Our  most  vivacious  sources  for  the  expedition  in  behalf 
of  Wheelock's  School  are  the  letters  of  Whitaker  and  the 
diary  of  Occom.  Occom  was  the  unique  feature  of  this 
mission.  No  Indian  preacher  had  gone  before.  He  was 
now  just  over  forty,  a  picturesque  figure,  a  sincere  man,  and 
an  earnest  preacher,  possessed  of  some  imagination.  Be- 
sides, as  Dr.  Love,  his  biographer,  well  says,  "  the  secret  of 
his  power  was  in  the  fact  that  he  was  himself  the  embodi- 
ment of  his  cause."  ^  Whitaker  was  only  thirty-three,  a 
man  of  ability,  shrewd  and  blunt  at  the  same  time,  matter- 
of-fact,  and  a  good  correspondent. 

They  sailed  from  Boston,  December  23,  1765,  in  the 
ship  "  Boston  Packet,"  under  Captain  John  Marshall,  whose 
1  Love,  Samson  Occom,  p.  137. 


Samson  Occom 

Native  of  the  Mohegan  tribe  ;  first  Indian  pupil  of  Eleazar  Wheelock  ;  successful 

solicitor  of  funds  in  England  previous  to  the  chartering  of  the  College 


THE  ORIGINS   OF  DARTMOUTH   COLLEGE  33 

receipt,  in  the  possession  of  the  College,  shows  that  the 
passage-money  for  the  two  was  ;f  20,  of  which  ^^5,  the  share 
of  one  owner,  was  remitted  by  that  owner's  express  wish ; 
his  name  was  John  Hancock,  They  reached  London 
February  6,  1766.  It  was  a  great  experience  for  them 
both.  Occom's  simplicity  and  piety  are  evident.  I  make 
a  few  quotations  from  his  diary.  He  begins  with  some 
formality : 

"MoHEGAN,  November  21,  1765. 

"  The  Honorable  Commissioners  In  Connecticut  New 
England  for  propagating  Christian  Knowledge  and  Litera- 
ture among  the  Indians  having  Maturely  Consulted  the 
Expediency  of  Sending  some  fit  Person  to  Europe  to  Cali- 
cet  assistance  from  God's  People  at  Home  in  this  Heavy 
and  good  Work  and  appointed  the  Rev'd  Nathaniel  Whit- 
aker  to  go  —  and  thought  it  good  to  Send  me  to  accom- 
pany him,  and  Accordingly,  not  Doubting  the  Call  of  God, 
and  my  Duty  to  go,  on  Thursday  the  21  of  Novr.  as  above; 
in  obedience  to  the  Strange  Call  of  Providence,  having 
Committed  myself.  Family  and  Friends  to  the  Care  of 
Almighty  God,  took  Lieve  of  them  about  11  A.  M.  and  went 
on  my  Journey  towards  Boston  in  order  to  take  a  voyage 
from  thence  to  Europe.  .  .  .  The  Adversaries  Stand  at  a 
Distance  Like  Shemei.  But  they  don't  speak  a  Loud  as 
they  did,  they  now  Contrive  their  Projects  in  Secret,  and  it 
is  suppose'd  they  are  preparing  Whips  for  us  (Letters)  to 
send  to  Europe  by  the  Same  Ship  we  are  to  go  in." 

(London)  "  Monday,  Febru'  loth.  Mr.  Whitefield  took 
Mr.  Whitaker  and  I  in  his  Coach  and  Introduced  us  to  my 
Lord  Dartmouth,  and  apear'd  like  a  Worthy  Lord  indeed 
Mr.  Whitefield  says  he  is  a  Christian  Lord  and  an  un- 
common one.  .  .  . 

"Last  Sabbath  Evening  I  walk'd  with  Mr.  Wright  to 
Cary  a  letter  to  my  Lord  Dartmouth  and  Saw  Such  Con- 

3 


34        DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

fution  as  I  never  dreamt  of,  there  was  some  at  Churches 
Singing  p'g  ^  and  Preaching,  in  the  Streets  Some  Cursing, 
Swearing  and  Damming  one  another,  others  was  holloaing, 
Whestling,  talking,  gigling,  and  Laughing,  and  Coaches 
and  footmen  passing  and  repassing,  Crossing  and  Cress- 
Crossing,  and  the  poor  Begers  Praying  Crying  and  Beging 
up  on  their  Knees." 

Whitaker's  letters  are  more  to  the  point.  They  bristle 
with  the  affairs  in  hand,  the  importance  of  patronage,  the 
conflicts  of  religious  prejudice : 

«  Mar.  19,1766. 

"...  Mr.  Whitefield  is  entirely  friendly,  and  by  his 
friendship  I  have  my  Lord  Dartmouth's,  so  our  way  to  the 
throne  is  very  short.  .  .  .  The  kg.  hath  not  seen  Mr.  Occom 
as  yet  because  of  this  plagy  stamp  act.  But  now  thats 
all  over  I  expect  he  will  see  him  as  soon  as  Mr.  Occom 
is  well  of  ye  smallpox,  which  tis  likely  will  be  in  8  or  10 
Days.  .  . .  The  K.  has  promised  ;f  400  i^%  when  this  is  done 
and  comes  to  be  known;  then  the  carnal  Presbyterians 
or  Ariano  (oi  vis),  will  be  obliged  to  follow,  as  well  as  the 
Church  folks."  It  does  not  appear  that  the  meeting  with 
the  king  actually  took  place.    The  king  finally  gave  ;^200. 

Of  malicious  reports  sent  from  America  Whitaker  writes : 
"July  22,  1766.  Dear  Brother,  I  remember  you  once  said 
that  Lies^have  no  Legs ;  but  I  can  assure  you  that  they 
have  Legs,  or  Wings,  or  some  other  Way  of  swift  convey- 
ance, as  you  will  see  in  the  sequel  of  this  letter."  His 
writing  is  chiefly  of  the  pressing  business  of  his  mission. 

The  two  traversed  England  and  Scotland,  preaching, 
appealing,  collecting  money  for  the  school.  Among  English 
subscribers,  besides  the  king  and  Lord  Dartmouth,  appear 
the  names  of  the  Duke  of  Bolton  and  the  Earl  of  Shaftes- 
bury, the  Bishop  of  Deny,  and  various  Anglican  clergy- 

*  ?  praying. 


THE  ORIGINS  OF  DARTMOUTH  COLLEGE  35 

men,  though  coldness  soon  developed  on  the  part  of  the 
church  authorities  which  limited  the  field  as  far  as  Angli- 
cans were  concerned ;  we  find  also  Merton  College  at 
Oxford  and  the  Vice-Chancellor  of  Cambridge  University, 
Governor  Wentworth  and  Governor  Dinwiddle,  the  Corpo- 
ration of  Hull,  the  Mayor  and  Corporation  of  Newcastle- 
on-Tyne,  and  "  the  Quakers."  Some  twenty-five  hundred 
items  appear  in  the  list,  many  of  them  representing  collec- 
tions of  various  sums.  The  poor  took  their  share.  "  A 
Widow  "  (in  Bristol)  gave  5 j.  ;  *'  Two  Widows,"  at  Cogges- 
hall  in  Essex,  gave  los,  6d.  The  reception  in  Scotland 
also  was  warm,  with  much  jealousy  of  Anglican  influ- 
ence. University  honors  came  to  Wheelock  at  Edinburgh 
and  to  Whitaker  at  St.  Andrews. 

Even  in  this  brief  sketch  of  the  British  mission,  it  is 
right  to  specify  more  particularly  three  friends  of  the  move- 
ment who  stood  long  in  close  relation  to  it.  One  was 
Robert  Keen,  a  woollen-draper,  who  afterward  became 
Secretary  to  the  Trust,  who  wrote  often  to  Wheelock  and 
other  friends  of  the  school,  and  made  subscriptions  from 
time  to  time,  whose  large  extent  was  never  publicly 
known. 

Another  was  John  Thornton,  a  rich  merchant  of  Clap- 
ham,  of  hearty,  generous  nature,  full  of  good  works.  His 
benevolence  was  overflowing  and  even  romantic,  and  his 
religious  sympathies  were  deep  and  wide.  He  gave  much 
money  to  Wheelock's  enterprise  and  used  his  rare  business 
capacity  in  administering  the  trust  funds  gained  by  the 
collections  in  England,  as  Treasurer  of  the  English  Trus- 
tees. The  "chariot,"  or  English  coach,  which  Wheelock 
used  for  a  year  in  Connecticut,  and  in  which  Mrs. 
Wheelock  made  her  first  journey  to  Hanover,  was  a  present 
from  him. 

The  third,  whose  position  and  influence  were  decisive, 


36  DARTMOUTH   HALL  CORNER-STONE 

and  whose  name  the  College  will  commemorate  while  the 
College  stands,  was  a  young  nobleman  of  thirty-five. 

Feb.  lo,  1766,  Whittaker  and  Occom  were  presented 
by  Whitefield  to  the  Earl  of  Dartmouth,  whose  in- 
terest was  already  secured.  Lord  Dartmouth  had  suc- 
ceeded to  the  earldom  on  the  death  of  his  grandfather, 
the  first  Earl,  in  1750,  when  he  was  a  boy  of  nineteen  at 
Oxford.  There  he  was  entered  at  Trinity  College  and  took 
his  degree  in  1751.  He  was  observant,  impressionable, 
attractive,  of  simple  tastes,  frank  enthusiasm,  and  loyal 
temper.  He  wrote  to  Dr.  Huddesford,  of  Trinity,  from  the 
Continent  in  1751:^  "At  Hesse  Cassel  saw  our  Princess 
Mary,  and  were  honoured  with  a  seat  at  the  Landgrave's 
table,  —  a  mighty  agreeable  court,  where  they  used  very 
little  ceremony";  and  in  1752,2  that  he  was  "  Glad  to  hear 
the  Old  Town  Hall  was  at  last  destroyed  and  that  a  new 
one  would  soon  be  in  its  place,  nothing  else  was  wanting 
to  make  Oxford  perfect,  which  was  already  the  handsomest 
town  in  England."  These  homely  touches  help  us  to 
understand  the  man.  His  father,  Viscount  Lewisham,  died 
Aug.  29,  1732,  without  coming  to  the  title,  and  in  1736  his 
mother  became  the  second  v/ife  of  Francis,  Baron  Guilford 
and  North  (created  Earl  of  Guilford  in  1752).  In  two 
ways  this  connection  was  of  importance  for  him  and  for 
our  history.  Lord  Guilford  also  had  a  son,  Frederick,  a 
year  younger  than  the  son  of  Lady  Lewisham,  and  the 
two  boys  grew  up  together.  Frederick  was  afterward 
known  as  Lord  North,  and  made  his  mark  on  our  history. 
This  fellowship  no  doubt  helped  to  turn  Lord  Dart- 
mouth's thoughts  to  public  life.  He  entered  Lord  Rock- 
ingham's ministry  in  1765  at  the  head  of  the  Board  of 
Trade,  but  joined  the  Tories  in  1771,  and  in  1772  became 

1  July  28,  Dart.  MSS.  i,  330. 

2  August  26,  from  Vienna,  Id.  ib. 


THE  ORIGINS  OF  DARTMOUTH    COLLEGE  37 

Secretary  of  State  for  the  American  Department  under 
Lord  North,  holding  this  office  till  1775,  when,  at  his  own 
desire,  he  gave  it  up  for  the  Privy  Seal,  finally  leaving  the 
government  in  1782.  In  1786  he  was  appointed  High 
Steward  of  the  University  of  Oxford  by  Lord  North,  then 
Chancellor  of  the  University.  Me  had  a  keen  sense  of  jus- 
tice and  was  active  in  promoting  the  repeal  of  the  Stamp 
Act  in  1766.  Americans  looked  to  him  in  confidence  and 
hope.  If  he  did  not  read  all  the  signs  of  the  times,  or, 
reading  them,  was  unable  to  obey  them  and  do  anything 
effective  for  peace,  no  great  fault  can  now  be  found.  There 
were  few  about  him  who  could  read  the  signs,  and  none 
who  could  follow  them.  The  forces  were  too  strong  for 
any  man  to  deal  with.  When  the  issue  was  finally  joined 
his  deeply  loyal  disposition,  strengthened  perhaps  by  strong 
personal  ties  of  attachment  between  himself  and  the  king, 
held  him  firmly  to  the  measures  of  the  crown,  but  without 
bitterness.  In  1766  he  was  recognized  as  a  nobleman 
whose  sympathy  for  things  American  could  be  counted  on. 
The  other  result  of  his  mother's  marriage  with  Lord 
Guilford  was  even  more  noteworthy  for  us.  She  died  in 
1745,  and  in  1751  (June  13)  Lord  Guilford  married  once 
more.  His  third  wife  was  the  widowed  Countess  of 
Rockingham,  who  was  a  cousin  of  the  Countess  of  Hun- 
tingdon, and  introduced  the  young  Earl  of  Dartmouth  to 
her.  He  became  interested  in  the  religious  movement 
which  was  afterward  known  by  Lady  Huntingdon's  name, 
and  of  course  prominent  in  it.  It  was  at  that  time  a  circle 
within  the  Anglican  church.  Through  it  Lord  Dartmouth 
was  brought  into  close  touch  with  Whitefield,  Wesley, 
Toplady,  "  and  other  eminent  supporters  of  Calvinistic 
Methodism,"  as  Mr.  Stevens  puts  it,^  and  his  own  convic- 
tions were  permanently  engaged. 

1  Dart.  MSS.  ii,  pp.  xv,  xvi. 


38        DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

This  notable  movement  toward  personal  religion  which 
appeared  during   the   eighteenth   century  under  different 
names  and  forms  and  in  various   lands  no  doubt  had  in  it 
much  that  was  imperfect.     It  may  have  made  too  sharp 
a  distinction  between  the  souls  of  men  and   the   rest  of 
them,  and  sometimes  (not  in  the  case  before  us)  it  may 
have  been  more  religious  than  human,  but  it  exalted  the 
spiritual  and  the  immortal  over  against   the   material, — 
which  is  the  work  of  the  true  prophets  and   leaders  of 
mankind  in  every  age.     It  was  perhaps  intellectually  nar- 
row, but  it  actually  enlarged  the  human  outlook.     Instead 
of  being  concerned  for  their  own  interest,  and,  for  their 
own  ease  and  advancement,  ignoring  others  or  treading 
them  down,  men  began   to   think   intensely  about  other 
people;    the  horizon   grew  very  wide;    human    impulses 
were  quickened,  and  the  desire  possessed  men  and  women 
to  share  their  best   privileges,  their  highest   hopes   and 
possibilities,  with  all  the  people  in  the  world.    The  move- 
ment was  no  more  free  from  extravagances  and  unlovely 
growths  than  the  Puritan  revival  in  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury was,  or  the  Reformation  in  the  sixteenth,  but,  like 
these,   it  brought    men   back  to   the    great   and    simple 
verities  of  life,  and  set  them  forward  a  good  stage  on  the 
path  of  human  progress. 

Lord  Dartmouth  was  of  great  use  in  this  movement. 
He  had  married  in  1755,  and  Lady  Dartmouth  was  like- 
minded.  "  His  house  at  Sandwell,  near  Birmingham  [I 
quote  again  from  Mr.  Stevens,  ib.],  was  the  resort  of  many 
of  the  preachers,  and  Lady  Dartmouth's  drawing  room  at 
Cheltenham  was  opened  for  religious  meetings.  ...  As 
early  as  1767,  during  a  serious  illness  of  Lady  Huntingdon, 
he  was  spoken  to  concerning  the  taking  over  of  her 
chapels  in  the  event  of  any  such  exigency.  ...  It  was 
Lord  Dartmouth  who  prevailed  on  the  Bishop  of  Lincoln 


THE  ORIGINS  OF  DARTMOUTH  COLLEGE  39 

to  ordain  John  Newton."  It  is  perhaps  not  fanciful  to 
think  that  such  protection  as  his  helped  to  make  it  pos- 
sible for  Whitefield,  for  all  his  canonical  offences,  to  remain 
within  the  Church  of  England. 

It  is  easy  to  see  what  such  a  friend  meant  to  Wheelock's 
work, —  a  nobleman  of  exceptional  standing  and  connec- 
tions, a  favorite  of  the  king,  a  member  of  the  government, 
an  evangelical  Christian,  familiar  with  the  type  of  piety  that 
marked  the  "  Great  Awakening,"  and  wholly  sympathetic 
toward  it,  responsive,  like  all  the  circle,  to  missionary 
zeal,  and  having  the  personal  bond  of  a  common  friend- 
ship with  Whitefield.  We  can  hardly  measure  the  effect 
of  such  support  at  so  critical  a  time.  The  opportunity 
has  too  seldom  been  given  us  of  expressing  this  obligation 
to  any  of  his  descendants  by  word  of  mouth,  and  all  the 
more  we  welcome  the  courtly  presence  of  one  of  them 
to-day. 

The  success  in  England  and  Scotland  was  the  success 
of  Wheelock's  school  as  an  agency  for  making  Indians  in- 
telligent Christians.  How  did  Dartmouth  College  emerge 
from  this? 

One  of  Wheelock's  first  thoughts  about  his  enlarging 
school  was  of  such  legal  organization  as  should  enable  it 
to  hold  property,  encourage  gifts,  and  secure  permanence. 
Hence  the  attempted  self-incorporation  to  receive  More's 
gift ;  ^  hence  an  appeal  to  the  English  Government  for  a 
charter  in  1757;^  hence,  by  the  advice  of  Lord  Halifax, 
an  application  to  the  Connecticut  Legislature,  instead,  in 
1758,^  and  a  see-saw  between  the  province  and  England 
in  this  matter,  till  1 764,*  when  it  was  dropped.  There  was 
in  fact  a  deadlock.  It  was  thought  that  Connecticut, 
being  a  charter  colony  with  prescribed  rights,  had  in- 

1  Chase,  10.  *  Chase,  14. 

«  Chase,  ib.  *  Chase,  38. 


40  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

sufficient  power  to  grant  a  valid  school  charter  unless 
this  were  ratified  in  England ;  but  the  colony  feared  that  a 
reference  of  its  action  to  England  might  impair  its  rights 
for  the  future.  Besides,  there  were  more  private  jealousies 
and  questionings.  On  the  other  hand  the  Home  Govern- 
ment felt  no  sufficient  motive  to  grant  a  school  charter 
direct,  except  on  formal  action  by  the  Legislature  of 
Connecticut.  So  there  they  were.  Phineas  Lyman  and 
Eliphalet  Dyer,  Americans  in  London  with  schemes  of 
their  own,  were  equally  unable  to  secure  a  charter  for 
Wheelock.1 

Meantime,  some  of  the  advantages  of  a  charter  were 
sought  by  a  "brief,"  or  public  authority  from  the  Legisla- 
ture to  make  collections,  in  1763,  which  was  renewed  in 
1766.2  Twenty-five  ministers  of  Connecticut  indorsed  the 
school  in  1762  in  a  printed  document.^  At  Wheelock's 
request  and  nomination,  the  Scotch  Society  appointed 
thirteen  "correspondents"  in  Connecticut,  in  1763-64; 
they  chose  five  of  their  number  as  a  responsible  standing 
committee  on  the  school  in  1765.  These  were  more  or 
less  useful  makeshifts.  None  of  the  persons  concerned  had 
either  Wheelock's  intense  interest  in  the  school  or  his 
grasp  of  the  possibilities  and  needs.  Mr.  Chase  quotes  him 
as  writing  in  1765  :  I  am  "  quite  sick  of  the  thought  of  con- 
ducting a  charity  school  by  a  body.  They  won't  attend  so 
as  to  understand  it.  They  are  diffident;  too  sudden  and 
peremptory  in  their  conclusions  before  they  have  well 
weighed  matters."* 

Whitaker  went  to  England  with  the  thought  of  a  charter 
in  his  mind,  evidently  connected  with  the  hope  of  large 
collections,  but  his  advisers  there  discouraged  it.  He 
writes  in  February,  1766:  "If  the  present  ministry  stands 

1  Chase,  34.  ^  chase,  37,  71. 

«  Chase,  27.  *  Chase,  45. 


THE  ORIGINS  OF  DARTMOUTH  COLLEGE  4 1 

[Lord  Dartmouth  being  President  of  the  Board  of  Trade 
and  Plantations],  I  could  easily  obtain  a  charter  ;  but  it  is 
tho't  best  to  give  it  all  to  you  to  be  handed  down."  Again 
in  March  :  "  I  am  discouraged  attempting  to  get  a  charter 
because  it  is  tho't  it  wd.  cramp  you  (inter  nos)."  The 
charter  is  here  thought  of  as  involving  protection  for 
English  funds. 

When  the  large  collections  actually  began,  the  question 
of  English  trustees  for  this  particular  fund  was  raised 
also.  At  first  all  leaders  in  the  movement  were  opposed  to 
it.  Wheelock  saw  no  use  in  a  controlling  body  so  far  from 
the  actual  scene.  Englishmen  took  the  same  view.  In 
June,  1766,  Whitaker  writes:  "There  has  been  an  obstruc- 
tion to  the  work  for  want  of  trustees  to  receive  y^  money; 
and  after  much  consultation,  my  Lord  [i.  e.  Dartmouth] 
said  He  tho't  there  was  no  necessity  for  trustees,  but  that 
the  money  should  be  lodged  with  you,  and  you  immediately 
appoint  your  successor  and  fix  the  trust  in  his  hands  so  as 
to  secure  it  to  the  use  of  the  school  —  for  that  on  the  most 
thorough  search  he  could  make,  no  intestment  with  a  num- 
ber has  ever  secured  the  benefactions  for  the  end  for  which 
they  were  made ;  and  that  if  less  should  be  gathered,  the 
whole  would  be  more  dependent  on  God  and  his  glory 
would  be  the  more  clearly  seen ;  and  that  trustees  would 
tend  to  embarrass  you  and  your  successor  " — a  mixture  of 
religion  and  good  sense  that  is  characteristic.  A  few  days 
later :  "  You  must  immediately  make  your  will  and  fix 
your  Successor,  and  give  him  the  monies  in  trust  for  the 
School."  Once  more,  in  the  same  month :  "  A  charter  is 
not  necessary  —  the  most  of  the  Societies  here  are  self- 
formed  and  yet  some  have  very  large  funds,  yet  I  will  try  to 
obtain  a  charter,  if  friends  will  agree  —  but  I  know  yy 
will  object  that  it  will  tie  your  hands.  The  Serious  here 
are  sick  of  trusts."      The  vested  ecclesiastical  interests 


42  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

were,  as  we  know,  mainly  opposed  to  the  evangelical 
movement. 

There  is  no  further  question  of  a  charter.  But  evidently 
the  need  of  trustees  for  the  fund  was  felt  by  many,  and  at 
length  the  point  was  yielded.  Whitaker  writes  to  Whee- 
lock,  Nov.  24,  1766:  "A  trust  here  is  now  determined 
upon,  though  not  yet  constituted.  .  .  .  When  this  is 
done  (which  I  hope  will  be  in  a  short  time)  I  shall  take  a 
commission  from  them  to  collect,  and  then  the  objection 
about  the  trust  will  I  hope  be  at  an  end." 

The  trustees  were  nine:  Lord  Dartmouth  was  Presi- 
dent, Mr.  Thornton,  Treasurer,  Mr.  Keen,  Secretary ;  all 
were  real  friends  to  the  work.  Wheelock  by  no  means 
welcomed  them  in  their  new  capacity.  "  The  Serious  here 
are  sick  of  Trusts,"  Whitaker  had  said.  Wheelock  had 
been  quite  with  them  in  this,  —  he  was  a  **  Serious  "  him- 
self. And  now  he  was  asked  to  find  himself  cured  of  this 
sickness  without  experiencing  the  treatment  —  the  physic, 
or  the  course  of  waters  —  which  had  brought  the  English 
donors  to  another  mind.  If  Lord  Dartmouth  had  thought 
there  was  no  need  of  a  Trust,  much  more  Wheelock,  far 
from  the  hesitations  and  intrigues  which  had  at  length 
made  the  Trust  seem  necessary  to  his  English  friends,  and 
Whitaker  with  them.  And  if  he  had  found  the  manage- 
ment of  a  charity  school  by  "  a  body  "  a  troublesome  mat- 
ter, when  the  body  was  composed  of  his  neighbors,  who 
breathed  his  air  and  thought  his  thoughts  and  spoke  his 
language,  how  much  more  troublesome  must  he  think  it 
was  likely  to  be  when  made  up  of  gentlemen  whom  he  had 
never  seen,  who  themselves  had  not  his  eyes,  and  could 
never  lend  him  their  ears.  No  doubt  he  was  staggered  by 
it.  It  perhaps  saved  the  school,  but  he  did  not  know  that 
at  the  time.  He  always  felt  hampered  by  the  existence  of 
the  Trust,  yet  he  acquiesced,  and  at  least  his  second 


John  Thornton 
English  benefactor  and  friend  of  the  College 


THE  ORIGINS   OF  DARTMOUTH  COLLEGE  43 

thoughts  were  not  ungracious.  He  wrote  to  Whitaker,  Nov. 
28,  1767:  "The  gentlemen  of  y*"  Trust  shewed  a  laud- 
able and  truly  Christian  Integrity  toward  y''  Redeemers 
cause  as  y*"  matter  appeared  to  them  —  I  never  blamed 
them  so  much  as  in  a  tho't." 

In  fact,  though  the  distance  made  payments  slow,  and 
there  were  some  misunderstandings,  the  trustees  acted 
throughout  with  fidelity  and  consideration  both,  and  never 
lost  confidence  in  Wheelock, —  a  striking  evidence  both  of 
the  quality  of  the  man,  who  was  unknown  to  them  except 
by  correspondence  and  report,  and  of  their  sympathetic 
regard  for  his  work.  One  of  them,  Samuel  Savage,  wrote 
to  Wheelock  in  March,  1768:  **  I  hope  ways  and  means 
will  be  found  for  you  to  so  proceed  as  to  have  occasion  for 
all  the  money  that  is  collected  in  England  while  we  con- 
tinue to  live  ;  for  methink  I  should  be  sorry  to  leave  any 
of  it  to  another  generation."  There  is  certainly  no  trace 
here  of  a  wish  to  embarrass  Wheelock.  In  fact,  the  money, 
some  ;^  10,000,  was  all  expended  by  1766,  and  the  Trust 
then  passed  out  of  existence. 

The  Scotch  Society  for  Propagating  Christian  Knowledge 
became  trustee  of  the  collections  made  in  Scotland.  It 
decided,  mainly,  it  seems,  through  fear  of  Anglican  con- 
trol of  the  school,  to  send  only  the  interest  to  America, 
and  that  only  on  specially  scrutinized  requisition  and 
through  its  own  Board  of  Correspondents,  —  not  to  Whee- 
lock direct.  It  showed  suspicion  in  various  ways,  and 
administered  its  trust  legally,  no  doubt,  but  in  a  technical 
and  narrow  spirit.  At  length  its  payments  altogether 
ceased.  The  result  was  that  in  its  time  of  great  need  the 
College  had  scanty  benefit  from  this  source  —  whence  so 
much  might  have  come  —  and  that  now  there  is  a  large 
fund  remaining  in  the  hands  of  the  Society,  which  it  has 
since  that  time,  with  a  pathetic  scrupulousness  and  im- 


44  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

perfect  success,  been  trying  to  dispose  of  in  ways  approved 
by  its  own  exacting  conscience,  but  quite  unconnected 
with  the  enterprise  in  which  alone  the  agents  of  its 
collection,  Dr.  Whitaker  and  Mr.  Occom,  were  directly 
interested,  and  for  which  the  ardent  soul  of  Wheelock 
behind  them  throbbed  in  passionate  anxiety. 

Neither  the  English  Trust  nor  the  Scotch  Society  could 
at  all  take  the  place  of  an  incorporation  for  the  school. 
In  fact,  the  divided  interests  in  Great  Britain  made  a 
unifying  and  corporate  responsibility  in  America  all  the 
more  needful.  '*  I  don't  see,"  Wheelock  wrote  in  No- 
vember, 1767,  "  how  y^  affair  can  be  accommodated  without 
an  Incorporation,  or  at  least  a  Trust,  here."  In  the  same 
month  he  again  turned  to  the  Connecticut  Legislature, 
with  a  request  that  it  receive  and  administer  the  English 
funds,  but  this  was  declined.^  With  the  thought  of  a 
charter  was  also  connected  the  thought  of  an  endowment. 
The  difficulty  of  both  in  Connecticut  seemed  insuperable. 
Besides,  the  school  was  too  far  from  the  Indians.  As 
early  as  1762  there  was  a  distinct  idea  of  moving  it.  The 
Mohawk  valley,  the  Susquehanna,  even  the  Ohio,  were 
thought  of.  A  site  near  Albany,  with  [a.  possible  charter 
and  endowment  in  the  State  of  New  York,  was  considered, 
and  another  in  Western  Massachusetts.  Governor  Benning 
Wentworth  had  offered  land  in  Western  New  Hampshire 
in  1763.  When  Governor  John  Wentworth,  even  before  he 
left  England  to  assume  his  duties  as  his  uncle's  successor, 
took  up  the  business,^  it  advanced  rapidly.  The  English 
trust  favored  location  in  Western  New  Hampshire ;  ^  the 
charter  was  issued  by  Wentworth  as  Royal  Governor,  in 
the  king's  name,  under  date  of  December  13,  1769, 
according  to  the  terms  familiar  to  us,  with  a  considerable 

1  Chase.  64.  ^  chase,  55. 

^  April,  1769;  Chase,  113. 


THE  ORIGINS  OF  DARTMOUTH   COLLEGE  45 

grant  of  land  for  endowment.  The  location  was  fixed  at 
Hanover,  July  5,  1770,  after  much  conflicting  opinion, 
and  with  many  sharp  criticisms  from  without.  Indeed,  in 
1768,  the  objection  had  been  lodged  against  the  entire 
New  Hampshire  plan,  by  those  interested  in  securing  the 
school  to  Western  Massachusetts,  that  "  the  Governor  ot 
New  Hampshire  had  no  power  to  make  a  college  corpora- 
tion unless  specially  so  expressed  in  his  commission," 
accompanied  by  the  opinion  that  Governor  Bernard  of 
Massachusetts  would  "  doubtless  give  a  charter  by  order 
of  the  King."  ^  It  does  not  appear  that  the  objection  had 
real  validity.  Governor  Belcher  of  New  Jersey  had  estab- 
lished the  precedent  in  1748  —  and  indeed  acting  Gover- 
nor Hamilton  in  1746  —  in  the  case  of  Princeton,  and 
official  criticism  was  never  heard. 

Governor  John  Wentworth  lights  up  the  story  with 
a  bright  touch  which  is  very  charming.  He  is  a  gallant 
figure,  a  graceful,  brilliant  cavalier,  bold  and  sagacious  by 
instinct,  far  from  frivolous,  but  carrying  off  his  champion- 
ship of  a  good  cause  with  a  buoyancy  which  succeeds 
without  taking  account  of  its  own  pains,  is  cheerful 
and  confident,  and  never  seems  to  be  demanding  recogni- 
tion or  praise.  With  him  we  have  always  an  agreeable 
sense  of  the  amenities  of  life,  and  if  his  polished  diplomacy 
makes  it  sometimes  hard  to  estimate  his  motives,  it  is 
always  well  when  principle  and  policy  move  the  same 
way.  He  was  the  giver  of  the  famous  punch  bowl.  There 
may  be  those  who  think  no  better  of  him  for  that,  and  who 
would  consign  the  punch  bowls  and  lotteries  and  New 
England  rum  of  those  earlier  days  to  the  same  limbo,  — 
but  other  times,  other  manners,  and,  when  all  is  said,  the 
elegance  of  this  noble  punch  bowl  fits  the  man  not  ill !  He 
had  a  fund  of  earnestness  at  bottom.     He   believed   in 

1  Chase,''98. 


46  DARTMOUTH   HALL  CORNER-STONE 

Wheelock  and  Wheelock's  plan.  When  he  criticised,  as 
he  sometimes  did,  it  was  always  with  sympathy,  and  in  the 
interest  of  the  scheme.  He  was  circumspect  with  all  his 
light  touch,  dignified  at  every  approach,  maturely  concerned 
for  the  interests  of  his  province,  of  which  he  was  himself  a 
son,  and  faithful  to  the  appointing  power;  withdrawing 
therefore  from  his  post  when  the  colony  joined  in  the 
struggle  for  independence.  His  father  was  a  rich  mer- 
chant of  Portsmouth,  our  seaport  town;  Harvard  put  us 
under  direct  debt  by  educating  him  well.  He  was  gradu- 
ated there  in  1755,  and  had  spent  some  years  in  England 
when  he  was  appointed  Governor  of  New  Hampshire. 
This  was  in  1766,  and  he  was  then  twenty-nine  years  old. 
It  was  the  day  of  young  men.  Before  leaving  England  he 
met  Whitaker  —  introduced  to  him  by  a  letter  from  his 
own  father  —  and  gave  him  twenty  guineas  for  Wheelock's 
school,  promising  at  the  same  time  the  grant  of  a  township 
if  the  school  should  be  moved  to  New  Hamphire.  He  took 
up  the  matter  with  energy  when  the  time  came,  encouraged 
Wheelock  in  every  way,  showed  lively  interest  in  the 
location  of  the  school,  yet  without  dictation,  shouldered 
the  responsibility  of  the  charter  and  gave  personal  attention 
to  the  form  of  it,  assumed  the  active  duties  of  a  trustee, 
gained  public  support  for  the  new  institution,  and  con- 
tributed of  his  private  means.  He  travelled  across  the 
province  to  the  wilds  of  the  Connecticut  shore  to  attend  its 
first  three  Commencements,  and  fostered  it  at  every  turn. 
It  was  this  active  and  continued  interest  which  secured  to 
the  College  its  foothold  in  New  Hampshire.  It  is  not  too 
much  to  say  that,  whatever  others  might  have  done,  the 
actual  founding  of  Dartmouth  College  is  due  in  chief 
degree  to  four  men :  Eleazar  Wheelock,  George  Whitefield, 
who  introduced  his  school  to  British  supporters,  Lord 
Dartmouth,   the    responsible    head  of    the   English   col- 


THE  ORIGINS  OF  DARTMOUTH  COLLEGE  47 

lection  which  kept  the  school  alive,  and  Governor  John 
Wentworth. 

The  English  trustees,  in  their  turn,  were  displeased  with 
the  charter,  mainly  it  would  seem  through  the  fear  that 
the  enlarged  plan  would  diminish  the  emphasis  laid  on 
Indian  training.  They  insisted  that  the  moneys  in  their 
hands  should  be  used  in  the  Indian  work,  "  and  that  you 
do  not  blend  them,"  they  say,  **  with  your  college."  ^  In 
a  later  letter  they  remark:  **As  to  what  concerns  the 
charter  of  incorporation,  we  avoid  saying  anything  on 
that  subject,  which  is  a  matter  of  more  general  concern, 
and  does  not  relate  to  the  business  of  this  trust."  ^  Their 
authority  over  the  funds  in  their  hands  was,  however,  ex- 
pressly recognized  by  the  charter.  Wentworth  wrote  a 
most  reassuring  letter  ^  to  them,  and  they  seem  not  to  have 
been  practically  influenced  in  their  administration  of  the 
trust  by  any  adverse  opinion  they  may  have  held.  But 
the  Governor's  great  desire  of  proving  the  catholicity  of 
the  new  institution  by  adding  the  then  Bishop  of  London, 
by  name,  to  the  English  board,  was  made  vain  by  the 
bishop's  absolute  refusal,  expressed  in  writing  to  Lord 
Dartmouth.* 

The  English  trustees  were  not  unnaturally  startled  by 
the  fact  that  an  Indian  charity  school  was  put  into  the 
New  Hampshire  mill  and  a  full-fledged  college  turned  out. 
And  yet  this  was  neither  surprising  nor  unreasonable  to 
those  on  the  ground.  It  did  not  involve  any  lessening 
of  Wheelock's  zeal,  or  any  scattering  of  his  energies.  His 
purpose  remained  a  missionary  purpose.  But  it  grew  more 
and  more  plain  to  him  that  missionaries  needed  an  ample 
training.  From  the  first  he  had  wished  to  put  Indians  at 
school  with  English  boys ;  he  must  therefore  satisfy  Eng- 

1  Chase,  244.  ^  chase,  245.  «  Chase,  126. 

*  Letters  brought  by  Earl  of  Dartmouth  in  September,  1904. 


48        DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

lish  parents.  Moreover  a  permanent  school  with  the  back- 
ing of  a  community  must  pay  its  debt  to  the  community, 
or  lose  its  vital  interest  there.  If  the  English  civilization 
with  which  the  Indians  were  to  come  in  contact  was  to  be 
living  and  genuine,  the  school  must  be  attracting  English 
youth  by  its  own  worth  in  education,  without  artificial 
effort. 

Besides  this,  Wheelock's  experience  was  changing  his 
view  of  the  best  way  to  effect  his  purpose.  He  found  his 
Indian  pupils  unsatisfactory  as  missionary  teachers.  It 
grew  clear  to  him  that  the  leaders  in  the  work  must  be 
of  English  blood.  Innate  tendencies  and  ties  of  race 
made  it  hard  to  train  the  Indian,  and  pulled  the  trained 
Indian  down  at  least  as  often  as  he  had  strength  to  lift 
others  up.  This  meant  more  white  scholars  and  fewer 
Indians  proportionately  in  his  school.  That  meant  again 
the  English  standard  and  close  approach  to  the  grade  of 
a  college. 

As  early  as  July,  1763,  Wheelock,  when  looking  for  a 
site  "  in  the  Heart  of  the  Indian  country "  had  proposed 
to  his  English  friends  a  careful  plan  providing  "  that  the 
school  be  an  academy  for  all  parts  of  useful  learning :  part 
of  it  a  College  for  the  education  of  Missionaries,  School- 
masters, Interpreters,  etc.  and  part  of  it  a  school  for  read- 
ing and  writing,  etc."  ^  John  Smith,  of  Boston,  describes 
the  actual  school  at  Lebanon  in  a  letter  of  May  18,  1764, 
and  says :  "  I  learnt  that  my  surprise  [at  the  quality  of 
the  scholarship]  was  common  to  ministers  and  other  per- 
sons of  literature  who  before  me  had  been  to  visit  this 
school,  or  rather  College,  for  I  doubt  whether  in  colleges 
in  general  a  better  education  is  to  be  expected."  ^  In  1768 
Wheelock  organized  a  collegiate  branch  in  the  school,  with 
a  separate  instructor,  —  at  first  to  save  the  expense  of  send- 
1  Chase,  32  f.  ^  chase,  26. 


THE  ORIGINS   OF  DARTMOUTH   COLLEGE  49 

ing  his  boys  to  college,  when  they  were  ready,  though  they 
still  enrolled  at  the  colleges  and  maintained  connection 
enough  there  to  get  their  degrees.^  At  the  end  of  the 
same  year,  the  Reverend  Ebenezer  Cleaveland,  who  had 
been  visiting  possible  sites,  says  the  school  may  **  be  formed 
into  a  Public  Seminary  or  College  to  serve  that  Province 
[New  Hampshire],  and  many  towns  in  other  Provinces 
adjacent,  and  more  than  possible  the  Canadian  country, 
with  Protestant  Divines."  ^  The  idea  is  growing,  but  still 
terms  are  interchangeable.  Phelps  writes  to  Wheelock 
from  Portsmouth,  October  18,  1769,  speaking  only  of  "  y* 
School,"  and  William  Parker  writes  to  Phelps,  October  18, 
*'  of  the  College  proposed  to  be  erected  here."  ^  Wheelock 
had  sent  to  Governor  Wentworth,  August  22,  a  draft  for 
the  charter  which  spoke  of  an  "  Academy,"  and  added 
to  his  letter  the  well-known  postscript :  "  Sir,  —  If  proper 
to  use  the  word  *  College '  instead  of  *  Academy '  in  the 
Charter,  I  shall  be  well  pleased  with  it."  *  Yet  on  Sep- 
tember 30,  when  he  feared  troublesome  conditions  from 
Wentworth,  he  asked  Hugh  Wallace,  of  New  York,  "  in 
the  most  agreeable  manner  to  propose  the  affair  to  Gov- 
ernor Colden  [of  that  Province]  and  know  if  he  will  grant 
a  generous  charter  for  this  school  in  that  part  of  your 
province."  He  says  also :  "  As  you  have  only  a  party 
college  in  your  Province  [King's]  such  an  academy  as  I 
propose  will  not  interfere  with  that."  And  further:  **I 
propose  to  have  one  [a  charter]  as  free  from  clogs  and 
embarrassments  with  any  names  as  the  charter  of  New 
Jersey  College  is,"^ 

From  all  these  indications  it  would  appear  —  I  speak 
with  submission  —  that  Wheelock's  eagerness  for  the  name 
and  style  of  a  college  was  less  insistent  than  some  have 

1  Chase,  88  f.  «  Chase,  107.  »  Chase,  118,  120. 

*  Chase,  114.  ^  Chase,  115. 

4 


so  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

thought,  while  it  is  evident,  from  his  comparisons  and 
actual  provisions,  that  he  contemplated  the  higher  educa- 
tion as  a  part,  and  an  important  part,  of  the  general  design, 
the  main  intention  of  which  remained,  at  last  as  at  first, 
to  reach  the  Indians.  The  charter  as  finally  issued  ex- 
pressed his  views  happily,  when  it  provided  **  that  there  be  a 
College  erected  in  our  said  Province  of  New  Hampshire  .  .  . 
for  the  education  and  instruction  of  Youth  of  the  Indian 
Tribes  in  this  Land  in  reading,  writing  and  all  parts  of 
Learning  which  shall  appear  necessary  and  expedient  for 
civilizing  and  christianizing  Children  of  Pagans  as  well  as 
in  all  liberal  Arts  and  Sciences :  and  also  of  English  Youth 
and  any  others :  "  and  so  it  stands  to-day. 

Lord  Dartmouth's  name  was  attached  to  the  College  by 
the  charter.  It  may  be  that  one  motive  was  the  hope  of 
disarming  criticism,  but  Lord  Dartmouth's  services  to  the 
school  for  years  past  were  reason  enough.  It  is  not  to  be 
supposed  that  Wheelock  expected  criticism  to  be  implac- 
able, still  less  that  he  was  in  any  way  playing  a  double 
game.  We  have  seen  that  he  retained  the  confidence  of 
the  English  trustees ;  Thornton,  Keen,  and  Savage  made 
repeated  and  liberal  gifts  to  him,  and  while  the  war  no 
doubt  in  some  cases  modified  their  interest  in  things 
American,  in  1776  we  find  Lord  Dartmouth  expressly 
begging  "  that  the  safety  of  the  College  might  be  recom- 
mended to  both  General  Sir  William  Howe,  and  his  brother 
the  Admiral."  ^  As  things  turned  out,  the  location  of  the 
College  was  its  protection,  but  this  solicitude  was  not  the 
less  kindly. 

That  Wheelock  and  all  here  concerned  understood  the 
College  simply  as  the  school  enlarged  and  made  perma- 
nent admits  of  no  doubt.  There  are  many  proofs  that  he 
thought  as  little  of  erecting  a  new  and  separate  institution 
1  Dart.  MSS.  ii,  xvii. 


William  Legge,  Second  Earl  of  Dartmouth 
For  whom  the  College  was  named 


THE  ORIGINS   OF  DARTMOUTH  COLLEGE  5 1 

by  the  side  of  the  school  as  he  did  of  abandoning  the 
original  purpose  of  the  school.^  Accordingly,  the  *'  Nar- 
rative" of  his  work,  which  was  issued  first  in  1763  for  use 
in  England,  and  in  many  continuations  later,  bears  j^in 
1771)  this  title:  "  A  Continuation  of  the  Narrative  of  the 
Indian  Charity  School  in  Lebanon,  in  Connecticut,  from 
the  year  1768,  to  the  Incorporation  of  it  with  Dartmouth 
College,  and  the  removal  and  settlement  of  it  in  Hanover 
in  the  Province  of  New  Hampshire."  And  so  in  subse- 
quent years.  The  establishment  here  of  a  distinction 
between  the  two  —  such  as  the  English  trust  had  assumed 
at  the  first  —  and  the  revival  of  the  name  "Moor's  In- 
dian Charity  School "  belong  to  a  later  period  of  the 
history. 

It  remains  true  that  the  hopes  which  Wheelock  and  his 
associates  shared  with  the  British  donors,  in  all  good  faith, 
were  meagrely  fulfilled.  The  College  kept  on  its  way 
without  suspension  during  the  War  of  Independence,  but 
the  Indians  withdrew  (at  that  time  they  were  chiefly  from 
Canada)  and  never  came  back  in  great  numbers.  Political 
severance  played  its  part  here,  yet  the  experience  of  Kirk- 
land's  Oneida  Academy,  and  indeed  of  William  and  Mary 
College,  and  of  Harvard,  shows  that  the  cause  of  the 
failure  was  not  of  a  temporary  or  local  kind.  Samuel 
Kirkland  was  a  pupil  of  Wheelock's  (1760-62),  one  of  the 
best  of  men,  an  efficient  missionary  among  the  Indians, 
and  their  most  influential  friend.  He  lived  half  his  life  in 
the  midst  of  the  Six  Nations,  and  held  them  friendly  to  the 
colonial  cause.  In  1793  he  founded  the  Hamilton  Oneida 
Academy,  out  of  which  Hamilton  College  grew.  It  was  a 
worthy  grandchild  of  Wheelock's,  as  Dartmouth  was  his 
child,  and  the  purpose  was  the  same.  But  no  Indian  pupil 
was  trained  at  Kirkland's  Academy.  The  restlessness  of 
^  Chase,  239  f.  al. 


52  DARTMOUTH    HALL   CORNER-STONE 

the  red  man  forbade  it.     It  is  not  strange  that  what  Kirk- 
land  could  not  do  amid  Indians  who  knew  and  trusted  him, 
living  like  him,  on  New  York  soil,  Wheelock  also  failed  in, 
with  Indians  whom  he  could  reach  only  at  arm's  length 
and  across  a  foreign  border.     So,  too,  the  work  for  Indians 
at  William  and  Mary  came  to  a  natural   end.     The  fact 
was  that  the  Indians  retreated  before  civilization,  and  the 
substantial   institutions  which  were  planted   to  transform 
them  could  not  follow.     They  had  struck  their  roots  down, 
as  they  must  if  they  were  to  live  and  do  their  assimilating 
work ;  it  was  impossible  to  pull  them  up  and  put  them  on 
wheels,  to  overtake  the  vanishing  red  men.     They  would 
have  died  on  the  way.     Colleges  of  lasting  influence  can 
be  planted  in  Turkey  and  Hindostan  and  China,  where  the 
people  are  fixed  to  the  soil.     But  the  Indians  were  of  a 
flitting   race.     They   peopled    the   land    but    thinly,   and 
when  pressed  upon  sought  wider  ranges,  or  shrunk  into 
settlements   of    no   great   size.     In   any   case   they  were 
beyond  reach  of  those  who  could  not  pursue  them  without 
abandoning  the  implements  and  the  resources  which  alone 
would   make   their   pursuit   effective.     This   I   think  had 
much  more  to  do  with  the  failure  than  the  difficult  charac- 
ter of  the  Indians  themselves,  to  which  President  Dwight 
mainly  ascribed  it.     There  is  convincing  proof  that  Indians 
can  be  civilized  in  numbers  by  the  right  influences   kept 
long  enough  in  contact  with  them,  but  the  College  could 
not   maintain   the   contact.      And    there   was  the   steady 
pressure  of  the  new  obligation.     The  College  had  become 
the  chief  literary  institution  of  its  State.     It  would  have 
been  treacherous  to  drop  its  work  there.     Large  interests, 
in  which  the  civilizing  of  Indians,  however  important,  was 
only  one  item,  demanded  its  continuance. 

What  the  sagacious  observer  just  named  remarks  further 
on  the  subject  is  worth  quoting :  **  You  are  not  to  suppose," 


THE  ORIGINS   OF  DARTMOUTH  COLLEGE  53 

he  says,^  "  that  any  blame  is  to  be  attached  either  to  Dr. 
Wheelock,  or  any  others  entrusted  with  this  concern.  An 
Indian  student  cannot  be  obtained,  ordinarily,  without 
great  difficulty.  What  is  at  least  as  important,  his  habits 
are  in  a  great  measure  fixed,  before  he  can  be  brought  to  a 
place  of  education."  After  referring  to  the  war,  he  says : 
"  Since  this  date  the  business  of  Missions  has  been  ex- 
tensively taken  up  by  other  bodies  of  men,  able  in  many 
respects  to  pursue  it  with  more  facility  and  with  more 
advantage,  also,  than  the  Trustees  of  a  literary  Institution. 
.  .  .  Those  who  liberally  contributed  to  the  establishment 
of  this  Seminary  [he  is  describing  a  visit  to  Hanover  one 
hundred  years  ago]  would,  were  they  alive,  have  the  satis- 
faction of  seeing  that,  although  it  has  not  answered  the 
very  ends,  at  which  they,  perhaps,  especially  aimed,  it  has 
yet  been  a  source  of  extensive  benefit  to  mankind." 

As  for  us,  whose  debt  to  the  College  and  to  those  who 
have  nourished  her  is  so  deep,  it  is  surely  not  for  us  to 
question  the  wise  and  sagacious  orderings  of  Providence  in 
her  behalf  and  ours.  No  man  can  tie  the  hands  of  God,  or 
prescribe  lines  for  his  working.  Each  decade  since  has 
been  a  new  demonstration  that  Wheelock's  service  was 
greater  than  he  knew. 

These  things  were  history  before  Dartmouth  Hall  was 
built.  The  vital  was  before  the  material.  We  loved 
Dartmouth  Hall  because  it  embodied  for  us  these  prior 
and  vital  things.  They  are  as  immortal  as  the  soul  of 
man,  and  the  fire  had  no  power  over  them.  We  raise  the 
New  Dartmouth  Hall  in  the  assured  faith  that  it  reaches 
back  over  the  ruins  of  the  old  one,  and  makes  connection 
with  the  same  past.  It  is  a  good  past,  full  of  the  lives  of 
good  and  earnest  men,  who  lived  beyond  themselves.  It 
puts  us  under  bonds.  We  must  inhabit  our  new  genera- 
1  D wight,  Travels^  ii,  116,  117. 


54        DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

tions  with  the  old  power.  In  mind  and  spirit  the  College 
was  of  England,  —  Old  and  New  England  both.  Cam- 
bridge and  Oxford  were  in  its  ancestry  through  Harvard 
and  Yale,  and  the  missionary  zeal  of  Whitefield  through 
the  broad  intellect  of  Wheelock.  In  its  early  management 
and  support  it  was  partly  Scotch,  but  again,  and  still  more, 
English.  It  has  shown  the  adaptive  and  assimilating 
power  which  has  made  England  the  colonizer  of  the 
world.  It  has  welcomed  the  learning  of  all  the  nations, 
taken  educational  methods  and  appliances  where  it  could 
find  the  best  of  them,  attracted  gifts  from  men  whose 
fathers  never  saw  Britain,  welcomed  to  its  fellowship  all 
races  and  all  religions.  We  are  bound  to  maintain  its 
tradition  of  scholarship.  We  are  bound  to  preserve  its 
breadth  and  academic  freedom.  We  are  bound  to  make 
it  tell  for  the  fraternity  of  all  who  speak  the  English 
tongue,  —  not  exclusively,  but  generously,  in  the  spirit  of 
brotherhood  among  men.  We  are  bound,  most  of  all,  to 
cherish  and  hand  on  the  purpose  to  serve.  It  has  been 
passed  down  to  us,  from  the  beginning.  To  convert  the 
Indians  was  a  plan  that  sounds  limited  to  us.  But  the 
very  kernel  of  its  lesson  is  that  a  man  shall  not  hoard 
himself,  nor  squander  himself,  but  give  himself  to  his  age, 
with  things  of  the  spirit  in  control  of  him.  If  we  are 
selfish,  or  mercenary,  or  live  meanly,  we  are,  so  far,  per- 
verting the  endowments. 

This  afternoon  we  shall  turn  from  our  history  and  take 
up  the  onward  march.  The  gateway  of  a  new  day  is 
building  for  us.  Have  no  fear  of  what  we  shall  find 
beyond  it. 

A  tree  grows  great  according  to  its  seed  and  the  depth 
and  richness  of  its  soil.  The  seed  of  Dartmouth  College 
was  a  brave  purpose.  Its  soil  was  a  strong  community  of 
men  who  feared   God.     This  ground   has   been  tilled  in 


THE  ORIGINS   OF  DARTMOUTH  COLLEGE  55 

patience  and  fertilized  with  prayers  and  tears,  and  re- 
freshed by  the  sunlight  from  heaven.  Men  in  each  gen- 
eration have  put  their  best  at  the  disposal  of  the  College. 
The  power  of  the  Almighty  has  been  over  it,  the  Eternal 
One  has  led  it  on.  What  hopes  are  too  daring,  what 
service  is  beyond  our  dreams,  when  behind  us  lie  years 
like  these? 


CONFERRING  OF  THE  HONORARY  DEGREE 
OF  DOCTOR  OF  LAWS  UPON  THE  EARL 
OF  DARTMOUTH 

By  the  president   OF  THE  COLLEGE 

Gentlemen  of  the  Board  of  Trustees  of  Dartmouth  College,  My  Colleagues  in 
the  Faculty,  and  Brethren  of  the  Alumni : 

IT  was  a  singular  but  happy  fortune  which  identified 
our  academic  family  at  the  beginning  with  the  an- 
cient and  honorable  family  of  Legge, —  a  family  which 
a  century  before  the  founding  of  the  College  had  earned 
the  recognition  of  the  King.  The  relationship,  though  in- 
volving no  corporate  responsibilities  on  either  side,  has 
with  us  developed  a  natural  and  honorable  sentiment, 
which  has  always  met  with  an  honorable  response. 

It  is  a  peculiar  pleasure,  however,  that  this  relationship 
can  be  individualized,  and  that,  on  fit  occasions,  members 
of  this  family  take  their  place  in  our  academic  fellowship. 
In  1805,  Edward  Legge,  then  Dean  of  Windsor,  afterward 
Bishop  of  Oxford,  received  from  the  College  the  degree 
of  Doctor  of  Divinity.  In  i860,  William  Walter  Legge, 
fourth  Earl  of  Dartmouth,  received  from  the  College  the 
degree  of  Doctor  of  Laws.  Both  of  these  degrees  were 
conferred  in  absentia.  For  the  first  time  a  member  of  this 
family  receives  a  degree  from  the  College  in  person. 

I  bid  you,  gentlemen  of  the  College,  rise  and  greet  our 
guest  as  he  enters  into  our  academic  kinship. 

William  Heneage  Legge,  Sixth  Earl  of  Dartmouth,  I 
have    the    honor   to  confer    upon    you,  by  direction   of 


THE  EARL  OF  DARTMOUTH  57 

the  Trustees  of  Dartmouth  College,  the  degree  of  Doctor 
of  Laws,  the  degree  through  which  the  colleges  and  uni- 
versities of  this  country  express  their  estimation  of  men 
in  public  life,  most  fitly  conferred  upon  you  in  recogni- 
tion of  your  active  political  service,  your  loyal  devotion 
to  public  affairs,  and  your  most  effective  interest  in 
historical  researches  relating  to  Great  Britain  and  the 
American  colonies,  and  no  less  fitly  conferred  upon  your 
Lordship  in  recognition  of  those  high  personal  qualities 
of  integrity,  vigor,  and  honor  through  which  you  have 
maintained  the  name  of  Dartmouth. 


PRESENTATION    OF    MANUSCRIPTS    BY 
LORD    DARTMOUTH 

Immediately  upon  the  reception  of  the  degree,  the  Earl 
of  Dartmouth  presented  to  the  President  a  package  of 
letters  and  documents  bearing  upon  the  origin  of  the  Col- 
lege, briefly  remarking  that  he  could  not  resist  the  oppor- 
tunity to  surrender  so  much  of  the  original  correspondence 
between  the  founder  of  the  College  and  his  ancestor  as 
he  had  in  his  possession,  believing  that  there  could  be 
no  better  place  for  these  historic  documents  than  in  the 
institution  which  was  the  product  of  these  letters. 

The  following  were  in  the  package : 

Five  letters  from  Eleazar  Wheelock  to  Lord  Dartmouth. 

Letters  to  Lord  Dartmouth  from  John  Thornton,  John 
Went  worth,  the  Bishop  of  London,  Samuel  Lloyd,  and 
members  of  the  School  and  College. 

Seven  letters  to  various  persons  from  Lord  Dartmouth, 
Eleazar  Wheelock,  Sir  William  Johnson,  Nathaniel  Whit- 
aker,  Matthew  Graves,  missionaries  to  the  Indians,  and 
Indian  pupils. 


WEDNESDAY  AFTERNOON 


INTRODUCTORY  WORDS  OF  THE  HON. 
SAMUEL   LELAND   POWERS 

Mr.  President^  Your  Lordship,  Ladies  and  Gentlemen  : 

THIS  occasion  furnishes  ample  reason  for  extend- 
ing hearty  congratulations  to  every  friend  of  old 
Dartmouth ;  it  emphasizes  the  new  era  upon  which 
the  College  has  entered,  and  reveals  the  loyal  spirit  of  the 
alumni  to  its  present  administration.     While  we  all  appre- 
ciate that  the  burning  of  the  old  hall  was  a  serious  loss  to 
the  College,  nevertheless  we  are  consoled  in  no  small  de- 
gree by  the  reflection  that  the  absence  of  Dartmouth  Hall 
may  be  the  reason  of  the  presence  of  his  Lordship,  —  so 
our  loss  is  not  without  its  compensation.     That  is  espe- 
cially true,  inasmuch  as  this  occasion  affords  us  an  oppor- 
tunity to  express  to  our  distinguished   guest   the   great 
obligation  we  are  under  to  his   illustrious  ancestor,  the 
second  Earl  of  Dartmouth,  for  the  invaluable  service  which 
he  and  his  countrymen  rendered  to  the  cause  of  liberal  edu- 
cation in  America  in  the  founding  of  our  College.     Nearly 
a  century  and  a  half  has  elapsed  since  President  Wheelock 
was  put  into  possession  of  the  funds  which  were  contributed 
so  generously  by  the  friends  of  the  College  in  England, 
prince  and  peasant  alike  joining  in  the  contribution,  and 
the  little  College  was  planted  in  the  wilderness  to  forever 
bear  the  name  of  an  illustrious  English  family.    To-day  we 
are  prepared  to  render  to  our  distinguished  guest  an  ac- 
count of  our  stewardship.     This  I  believe  we  can  do  with 
full  confidence  that  when  his  Lordship  returns  to  his  home 


62  DARTMOUTH   HALL  CORNER-STONE 

across  the  seas  he  will  be  justified  in  reporting  to  his  coun- 
trymen that  the  contributions  made  by  their  ancestors 
nearly  six  generations  ago  for  the  founding  of  the  College 
have  not  been  wasted  or  mismanaged.  We  also  feel  con- 
fident that  his  Lordship  will  find  nothing  in  the  history  of 
our  College  which  in  any  way  renders  it  unworthy  to  con- 
tinue to  bear  the  name  which  was  intrusted  to  its  founders 
by  his  distinguished  ancestor. 

My  first  duty  and  pleasure,  however,  is  to  present  to  you 
one  who  at  all  times  has  exhibited  the  true  Dartmouth 
spirit,  and  who  among  the  duties  of  a  most  exacting  pro- 
fession has  found  time  and  opportunity  to  prove  his  devo- 
tion and  loyalty  to  his  alma  mater.  I  now  take  great 
pleasure  in  presenting  to  you  Mr.  Charles  Frederick 
Mathewson  of  the  class  of  1882. 


ADDRESS   OF   MR.   MATHEWSON   IN 
THE   COLLEGE   CHURCH 

THE  passing  of  a  college  landmark,  endeared  by 
long  and  familiar  association,  is  —  to  the  alumni 
of  that  college  —  a  matter  of  no  small  concern ; 
and  in  this  direction  Dartmouth  has  within  the  last  few 
years  been  doubly  bereft. 

The  "  Old  Pine "  is  gone.  For  unknown  centuries  it 
stood,  grand  and  solitary,  upon  the  summit  of  yonder  hill, 
—  its  lofty  figure  appearing  in  silhouette  against  the  sky 
from  whatever  point  of  view. 

It  saw  the  advent  of  the  first  paleface  upon  this  plain ; 
it  witnessed  the  foundation,  the  struggle  and  the  triumph, 
of  this  College. 

At  its  foot  in  commencement  week  the  members  of 
every  graduating  class,  from  the  very  first  of  1771,  had  sat 
and  smoked  the  final  pipe  and  said  their  last  farewells  be- 
fore scattering  to  their  life  work,  never  again  to  meet  as 
an  unbroken  band  in  this  life;  and  few  were  the  returning 
alumni  who  did  not  seize  early  opportunity  to  revisit  the 
spot,  to  recall  the  circle  of  faces  that  once  met  there  in 
buoyant  youth,  and  to  repeat  in  sadness  the  names  of 
those  who  had  meanwhile  passed  away. 

But  decay  at  last  laid  its  inexorable  hand  upon  the  Old 
Pine.  Its  end  was  clearly  approaching.  A  tower  of  stone 
was  erected  by  its  side  by  the  alumni  to  commemorate  its 
place  in  College  sentiment ;  and  in  the  very  year  of  its 
completion,  scarce  ten  years  since,  the  Old  Pine  —  its  long 


64  DARTMOUTH   HALL  CORNER-STONE 

vigil   ended  —  was   found   prostrate  upon  the  earth  from 
which  it  sprang  and  to  which  it  must  return. 

Bitter  was  our  regret ;  for,  fashioned  by  the  hand  of  the 
Creator,  no  human  power  could  reproduce  its  like.  The 
Old  Pine  was  gone  forever. 

But  Dartmouth  Hall  still  remained,  —  the  pride  and 
idol  of  us  all.  Planned,  and  its  site  selected  and  donated 
by  Eleazar  Wheelock,  himself  virtually  contemporaneously 
with  the  establishment  of  the  College,  and  completed  dur- 
ing the  administration  of  his  son,  John  Wheelock,  after 
years  of  struggle  and  sacrifice,  it  spanned  three  centuries 
and  constituted  the  only  existing  link  between  the 
present  and  colonial  days. 

One  of  the  finest  examples,  and,  with  the  exception  of  Uni 
versity  Hall  at  Brown  and  Nassau  Hall  at  Princeton,  the  only 
remaining  example,  of  collegiate  architecture  of  the  colonial 
period,  it  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  at  the  time  of  its  de- 
struction it  was  the  most  interesting  and  characteristic 
college  building  in  the  United  States.  Others  may  have 
been  older,  but  none  so  intimately  connected  with  the 
whole  history  and  life  of  an  institution  of  learning;  for 
not  only  had  it  always  been  the  nucleus  of  the  College, 
but  for  nearly  fifty  years  it  was  the  entire  plant  of  the 
College  in  all  its  departments. 

Here  was  the  home  of  that  backbone  of  our  early  col- 
leges, the  classics  ;  here,  the  lecture-rooms  of  Proctor  and 
Wright,  and  Parker  and  Lord,  and  of  their  accomplished 
predecessors  in  those  chairs. 

Here,  too,  was  the  old  bell  which  summoned  us  to 
chapel  and  to  the  class-room;  here,  the  College  clock, 
which  seldom  agreed  with  the  bell. 

And  here,  above  all,  was  the  old  chapel,  in  which  every 
alumnus  now  living  had  sat;  in  which  from  time  imme- 
morial each  senior,  at  **  rhetoricals,"  had  addressed  the  as- 


CHARLES   FREDERICK  MATHEWSON  65 

sembled  undergraduates  to  their  supposed  edification  and 
enlightenment ;  and  in  which  at  the  opening  of  each  aca- 
demic year,  on  "  Dartmouth  Night,"  the  entering  class  had 
been  gathered  to  be  instructed  by  prominent  alumni,  while 
surrounded  by  the  portraits  of  their  distinguished  colle- 
giate ancestors,  in  the  history  and  traditions  of  the  College, 
that  they  might  be  impressed  with  the  standards  of  merit 
and  of  manhood  which  a  Dartmouth  man  was  expected  to 
support  and  maintain. 

What  an  air  of  inspiration  breathed  in  every  nook  of  that 
old  structure !  Had  that  distinguished  nobleman,  who 
conferred  upon  this  College  and  that  Hall  the  honor  of  his 
name,  been  granted  miraculous  power  sufficiently  to  pene- 
trate the  future;  had  he  foreseen  from  such  an  humble 
beginning  the  growth  of  this  institution  in  strength  and 
influence  during  the  century  and  a  third  that  has  passed  ; 
had  he  beheld  in  vision  those  hosts  in  numbers  and  ac- 
complishment which  from  year  to  year  have  come  trooping 
forth  from  those  grand  old  portals,  to  fill  such  places  in 
the  community  and  the  State,  —  representatives  of  the 
people  in  Congress,  senators  of  the  nation,  governors  of 
our  greatest  commonwealths,  wearers  of  the  ermine  in  our 
most  authoritative  courts  ;  and  had  he  identified  among 
the  throng  the  most  renowned  and  brilliant  advocate  that 
this  country  has  ever  produced,  the  wonderful  Choate,  — 
a  chief  justice  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  Union,  and 
perhaps,  considering  the  character  of  the  questions  with 
which  it  has  to  deal,  the  most  important  in  the  world,  the 
profound  and  learned  Chase, —  and,  towering  above  them 
all,  a  giant  form,  the  greatest  orator  and  statesman  of  his 
time,  who  should  become  known  as  the  "expounder  of  the 
constitution  "  of  his  country,  and  whose  logic  and  eloquence 
should  wring  from  a  reluctant  court  at  Washington,  in 
probably  the  most  celebrated  cause  in  its  history,  that  de- 

5 


66  DARTMOUTH   HALL  CORNER-STONE 

cision  which  not  only  rescued  from  destruction  the  char- 
tered rights  of  this  College,  but  for  all  time  insured  every 
other  college  and  eleemosynary  institution  in  the  land 
against  legislative  diversion  of  its  property  in  either  man- 
agement or  application,  from  out  the  channels  defined  by 
the  philanthropic  men  who  established  and  endowed  them, 
the  colossal  Webster:  —  might  not  that  noble  Earl,  great  and 
many  and  deserved  as  were  his  titles  and  his  honors,  have 
reckoned,  as  not  the  least  precious  among  the  distinctions 
of  his  house,  that  this  then  infant  College  and  that  modest 
Hall  had  been  baptized  with  his  name? 

Within  recent  years  Old  Dartmouth  had  been  divested 
of  its  stoves,  and  furnaces,  and  lamps,  and  candles,  and, 
with  modern  devices  installed,  we  looked  forward  with  a 
sense  of  security  to  its  future. 

How  great,  then,  was  the  shock  when  the  message  was 
flashed  to  us  one  February  morn  :  **  Dartmouth  Hall  is  in 
flames ;  "  with  what  determination  rose  the  alumni  to 
declare  that  by  their  contributions  it  should  be  restored,  — 
the  call  for  a  meeting  of  the  Boston  alumni,  issued  while 
the  Hall  was  still  burning,  concluding  with  the  ringing 
words  :  '*This  is  not  an  invitation,  but  a  summons  ;"  and 
with  what  joy  do  they  hail  this  day  of  the  initiation  of  the 
work,  counting  it  a  happy  and  splendid  augury  that  the 
present  honored  possessor  of  the  title  of  Dartmouth  has 
consented,  in  laying  this  corner-stone,  to  add  a  fresh  link  to 
the  chain  already  connecting  his  house  and  name  with  the 
history  and  the  fortunes  of  this  College. 

It  is  designed  that  the  new  Hall  shall  provide  for  all 
the  languages  and  for  philosophy,  —  that  is  to  say,  for 
what  was  distinctive  about  the  old  College.  Therein  over 
twenty  instructors  will  do  their  entire  work,  the  plant 
including,  in  addition  to  recitation  and  seminar  rooms,  a 
large  lecture-room  to  accommodate  from  four  hundred  to 


CHARLES   FREDERICK  MATHEWSON  6^ 

five  hundred  students  on  the  ground  floor  of  the  old 
chapel ;  and  every  student,  through  the  requirements  of 
English,  will  be  compelled,  in  order  to  earn  his  diploma, 
to  spend  a  goodly  portion  of  his  time  within  its  walls. 

Let,  then,  the  new  Dartmouth  rise,  as  speedily  as  trowel 
and  hammer  can  accomplish  it !  Let  it  rise  upon  its 
ancient  foundations,  and  the  very  facsimile  of  its  sur- 
passing original !  And  let  the  shades  of  bygone  days, 
scattered  by  the  flames  of  winter,  regather  about  its  beau- 
tiful bell  tower,  and  repeople  its  classic  halls,  that  the 
returning  alumnus  may  not  only  behold  in  it  the  repro- 
duction of  the  outward  proportions  which  he  loved,  but 
may  come  again  to  look  upon  it  as  the  symbol,  the  reposi- 
tory, and  the  incarnation  of  all  the  traditions  and  the 
glories  of  the  past ! 


WORDS   OF    MR.    POWERS,    INTRODUC- 
ING  MR.   QUINT 

DARTMOUTH  men  have  achieved  distinction  in 
every  field  of  endeavor  with  the  possible  excep- 
tion of  that  of  poetry,  —  unfortunately  we  have 
not  produced  many  poets.  But  of  late  the  poetic  tempera- 
ment among  Dartmouth  men  has  made  its  appearance. 
This  is  believed  by  many  to  be  due  to  the  rhythmic  har- 
mony which  exists  between  the  alumni  and  President 
Tucker.  Now  we  all  find  it  easy  to  write  poetry,  and  I 
take  great  pleasure  in  presenting  to  you  one  of  the  illus- 
trious of  our  modern  poets,  Mr.  Wilder  Dwight  Quint,  of 
the  class  of  1887. 


THE   CORNER-STONE   ODE 
"VOX   CLAMANTIS" 


FORTH  from  the  day  of  the  dawning, 
Voice  that  the  wilderness  thrilled, 
Cry  in  the  desert  proclaiming  the  way, 
Prophet  of  glory  fulfilled  — 
Comes  with  the  breeze  of  the  morning, 
Rings  through  the  forest  and  plain ; 
Echo  flung  on  from  the  hills  of  the  past 
Brings  here  its  tidings  again. 


THE  CORNER-STONE  ODE  69 

Changeless  the  message  she  beareth, 

Mother  of  men  and  of  deeds. 
Tender  her  smile  as  the  breath  of  the  Spring, 

Splendid  her  face  as  she  pleads  : 
"  On  through  the  land  yet  unscouted, 

Blazing  the  path  as  of  yore, 
Keeping  the  camp-fires  burning  bright, 

Beacons  of  truth  evermore." 

Hand  of  the  race  that  befriended 

Lends  to  our  strength  its  own ; 
Spirit  of  old,  reincarnate  anew, 

Broods  over  every  stone. 
Name  of  our  swift-flashing  fealty, 

War-cry  and  blessing  in  one, 
Comes  from  that  ancient  baronial  hall  — 

Dartmouth  !     We  shout  to  the  sun  ! 

Here  on  the  walls  of  the  fathers, 

Here  where  the  great  have  trod. 
Here  where  the  rugged  sires  of  our  sires 

Prayed  in  the  dawn  to  God, 
Riseth  the  beautiful  temple 

Up  from  the  flame  and  the  dust. 
Fairer  to  sight,  yet  still  firm  in  the  faith, 

Guard  of  an  ancient  trust. 

Into  the  march  of  the  ages, 

Rearing  her  torch  on  high, 
Lighting  the  way  to  the  waters  of  life, 

Passing  no  thirst-worn  by, 
Goeth  our  mother  Dartmouth, 

Stately,  serene,  and  strong. 
So  may  she  ever  love  but  the  right. 

So  may  she  hate  the  wrong. 


70        DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

O  thou,  our  mother  royal, 

Shelter  thy  children  to  be. 
High  o'er  the  clouds  and  the  wrack  and  the  storm 

Sunlight  gleam  ever  on  thee. 
Stanch  as  the  rock  where  thou  standest 

Set  thou  thy  banner  unfurled  : 
So  shall  it  blazon  the  sign  of  thy  hope 

Unto  the  uttermost  world. 


WORDS    OF   MR.    POWERS    INTRODUC- 
ING  THE   EARL   OF   DARTMOUTH 

DURING  the  past  few  days  we  have  been  express- 
ing to  our  distinguished  guest  our  opinions  of 
Dartmouth  College.  I  feel  confident  that  I  shall 
be  pardoned  by  this  audience  if  I  now  give  an  opportunity 
to  his  Lordship  to  tell  us  what  he  thinks  of  the  College. 
I  now  have  the  honor  of  presenting  to  you  the  Earl  of 
Dartmouth. 


SPEECH    OF    THE    EARL    OF    DART- 
MOUTH IN  THE  COLLEGE  CHURCH 

President  Tucker ,  Your  Excellency,  Ladies  and  Gentlemen : 

THOUGH  I  am  aware  that  it  would  be  difficult  for 
anyone,  and  impossible  for  me,  to  say  all  I  should 
like  to  say  to  you  to-day,  I  cannot  allow  this 
opportunity  to  pass,  without  endeavoring  to  express,  on 
behalf  of  those  members  of  my  family  present  here  to-day 
and  myself,  the  gratitude  we  feel  for  your  kindness  to  us. 

We  shall  never  forget  the  events  of  the  last  two  days, 
and  though  the  weather  has  not  smiled  on  us  to-day,  the 
warmth  of  your  welcome  has  taken  out  of  it  any  possible 
sting. 

On  such  an  occasion,  full  as  it  is  of  memories  of  the 
past,  it  would  be  impossible  entirely  to  forget  how  different 
are  the  relations  between  our  two  countries  now  and  then, 
but  we  at  any  rate  can  congratulate  ourselves  that,  bitter 
and  protracted  as  was  the  strife,  and  still  more  bitter  and 
longer-protracted  the  feelings  that  of  necessity  accompanied 


^2  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

the  Strife,  now  we  hope  forever  passed  away,  the  storm 
passed  us  harmlessly ;  and,  as  far  as  I  know,  the  relations 
between  "  Dartmouth  and  Dartmouth  "  have  never  altered, 
and  to-day  stand  on  a  firmer  footing  than  ever  before. 

In  your  College  you  have  a  great  history,  splendid 
records,  and,  above  all,  the  lives  of  your  great  men,  that 
stand  out  like  signposts  by  the  wayside  that  represent  the 
history  of  the  College.  And  though  Shakespeare  may  say 
of  man  that  the  good  he  does  '*  is  oft  interred  with  his 
bones,"  we  know  better  than  that,  and  we  kno\y  that  the 
life  of  a  great  man,  as  long  as  it  is  the  life  of  a  good  man, 
is  never  wasted,  but  stands  for  all  time,  as  an  example  and 
inducement  to  all  who  care  to  follow.  And  though  it  may 
be  given  to  the  very  few  to  reach  the  highest  ideal,  I  am 
confident  that  the  very  straining  after  it  makes  the  life 
of  the  liver  better  worth  the  living,  and  is  a  help  and 
encouragement  to  all  with  whom  he  is  associated. 

By  your  action  to-day  you  have  given  me  my  share  in 
your  history,  in  your  records,  and  in  the  lives  and  works  of 
your  great  men,  and  by  my  inclusion  as  a  member  of  your 
body  that  long  chain  of  connection,  the  first  link  of  which 
was  forged  by  Lord  Dartmouth  on  the  one  side  and  Dr. 
Wheelock  on  the  other,  that  chain  which  has  been  added 
to  link  by  link  as  generation  has  succeeded  generation,  is 
now  complete. 

I  have  already  said,  and  I  repeat,  that  we  shall  not  forget 
your  kindly  reception  of  us.  You  have  made  us  feel  that 
we  have  a  home  on  both  sides  of  the  water.  I  have  no 
degrees  to  offer,  in  exchange  for  the  one  you  have  given 
me  to-day,  but  I  can  at  any  rate  promise  you  this,  that  it 
will  be  my  earnest  endeavor  that  no  action  of  mine,  and  as 
far  as  I  can  control  and  influence  those  who  come  after 
me,  no  action  of  theirs,  shall  ever  cause  you  to  regret  the 
high  honor  you  have  done  me  to-day. 


ADDRESS  OF  PRESIDENT  TUCKER  AT 
THE  GRAVE  OF  ELEAZAR  WHEELOCK 

WE  are  indebted  to  Professor  Richardson,  the 
chairman  of  the  Committee  on  Arrangements, 
for  the  introduction  of  the  fine  touch  of  sen- 
timent which  brings  us  here,  at  the  grave  of  Eleazar 
Wheelock,  to  begin  our  march  to  the  site  of  Dartmouth 
Hall.  It  is  also  in  accordance  with  his  suggestion  that  a 
brief  word  is  spoken  here  by  myself  as  the  successor  of 
Dr.  Wheelock. 

The  gift  of  the  eighteenth  century  to  the  colleges  of 
America  was  the  gift  of  the  religious  spirit.  For  other 
endowments  our  debt  is  small.  The  ministry  of  wealth  to 
education  had  not  then  been  accepted,  and  of  organized 
learning  there  was  little  to  give.  The  learning  of  the  time 
was  chiefly  pedantry  or  culture,  not  distinctively  power. 

The  religious  spirit  was  the  great  educational  endow- 
ment, and  it  was  very  great,  because  it  was  creative.  It 
took  possession  of  fit  men  and  taught  them  to  lay  founda- 
tions upon  which  men  and  states  might  afterward  build 
securely  and  broadly. 

Eleazar  Wheelock  was  a  man  fitted  to  the  uses  of  this 
creative  and  energizing  spirit.  My  conception  of  him  is 
that  of  a  man  of  broad  understanding,  of  quick  and  stead- 
fast imagination,  and  of  an  imperious  will,  which  gave  him 
in  unusual  degree  the  power  of  initiative ;  but  I  think  of 
him  more  distinctly  as  a  man  able  to  receive  and  to  make 
room  for  those  mighty  influences  which  were  in  his  time 
stirring  the  hearts  of  willing  and  capable  men.     Eleazar 


74        DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

Wheelock  was  no  opportunist,  but  he  was  alive  in  all  his 
nature  to  the  most  serious  demands  and  opportunities  of 
his  age.  It  would  perhaps  be  fanciful  to  assume  that,  as 
a  college  student,  the  first  fellow  on  the  Bishop  Berkley 
foundation  at  Yale,  he  caught  the  full  significance  of  the 
great  bishop's  scheme  for  education  in  America.  Still  it 
is  true  that  no  man  ever  carried  that  scheme  so  near  to  its 
realization  as  did  Eleazar  Wheelock.  In  his  early  ministry 
there  came  among  the  churches  of  this  country  the  quick- 
ening power  of  George  Whitefield.  Many  opposed  White- 
field  and  his  doctrine.  Wheelock  welcomed  him  and 
accepted  his  message.  He  became  in  his  own  person  a 
recognized  part  of  the  **  Great  Awakening."  The  visit  of 
Whitefield  was  supplemented  in  the  providence  of  God  by 
another  visit  of  a  very  different  kind,  which  at  once  sug- 
gested, and  finally  directed,  the  course  of  future  service. 
While  still  a  young  pastor  and  teacher  there  came  to 
Wheelock's  study  an  Indian,  twenty  years  of  age,  asking 
for  advice  and  help.  Wheelock  took  him  to  his  home  as 
pupil,  almost  as  son,  and  after  four  years  sent  him  out 
equipped  for  work  among  the  churches.  Samson  Occom 
was  to  Wheelock  the  embodiment  of  an  idea,  an  idea 
which  became  a  purpose,  —  I  had  better  say,  a  passion  ;  an 
idea  for  which  he  was  ready  to  endure  toil  and  sacrifice, 
an  idea  for  which  he  was  quick  to  plead  with  the  churches 
and  legislatures  of  his  country,  an  idea  which  he  was  not 
ashamed  to  present  at  the  court  of  his  sovereign. 

It  was  twenty-six  years  from  the  visit  of  Samson  Occom 
to  the  signing  of  the  charter  of  Dartmouth  College.  At 
almost  threescore,  Eleazar  Wheelock  left  his  home  and 
church  and  people,  where  he  had  dwelt  for  thirty-five 
years,  and  built  his  altar  and  pitched  his  tent  in  this 
wilderness.  He  had  but  ten  years  in  which  to  accomplish 
his  work.     It  was  an  old  man's  task.     The  founding  of 


PRESIDENT  TUCKER  JS 

this  College  is  a  witness  to  the  power  of  a  courageous, 
persistent,  indomitable  faith. 

It  would  be  unjust  to  this  man,  standing  beside  his 
grave,  to  deny  his  faults,  faults  which  inhered  in  his  tem- 
perament. Great  men  do  not  ask  us  to  forget  their  faults. 
This  man  was  great  enough  to  carry  them  to  the  end  and 
make  his  goal. 

The  writer  of  his  epitaph  has  caught  the  spirit  of  his 
life.  Beginning  as  a  record  it  ends  as  a  challenge.  I  have 
often  read  it  to  invigorate  my  own  soul.  But  it  was  written 
not  alone  for  his  successors  in  the  office  which  he  created, 
nor  yet  for  workers  in  the  cause  for  which  he  gave  his 
life,  but  as  the  writer  says,  even  for  the  wayfaring  man 
who  may  pass  his  grave.  I  rehearse  it  therefore  in  your 
presence. 

By  the  gospel  he  subdued  the  ferocity  of  the  savage  ; 

And  to  the  civilized  he  opened  new  paths  of  science. 

Traveler, 

Go,  if  you  can,  and  deserve 

The  sublime  reward  of  such  merit. 


WORDS    OF    MR.    POWERS    AT    THE 
LAYING   OF  THE   CORNER-STONE 

Vour  Lordship : 

IN  behalf  of  the  Trustees,  and  in  behalf  of  every  friend 
of  the  College,  I  now  present  to  you  in  their  name 
this  trowel,  with  the  request  that  you  lay  the  corner- 
stone of  the  new  Dartmouth  Hall,  and  that  you  may  feel  in 
so  doing  that  you  are  continuing  the  great  work  of  liberal 
education  in  America  to  which  your  illustrious  ancestor 
and  your  countrymen  gave  such  generous  and  timely  aid 
nearly  a  century  and  a  half  ago. 


WORDS   OF   THE   EARL   OF   DART- 
MOUTH   AT   THE   LAYING   OF 
THE   CORNER-STONE 

j4  ND    now   in   the   name    of   the    Father,   Son,   and 
/Jk       Holy  Ghost   I   declare   this   Corner-Stone   well 
^    -^     and   duly   laid.      Floreat  et  haec   nostra   domus 
esto  perpetiia. 


WEDNESDAY   EVENING 


ADDRESSES   AT  THE  BANQUET   IN  COLLEGE  HALL 
IN   HONOR  OF  THE   EARL  OF  DARTMOUTH 


TOASTS 

Pagb 

The  President  of  the  United  States 79 

His  Majesty  the  King  of  England 79 

Our  Guest:  The  Earl  of  Dartmouth 79 

Response  by  the  Earl 80 

The  Dartmouth  and  the  Washington  Arms      ....  85 

Response  by  Hon.  Charles  Theodore  Gallagher     ..  85 

Letter  from  British  Ambassador 96 

Telegram  from  Mr.  Edward  Tuck 97 

The  Commonwealth  and  the  College  :   The  Governor 

of  the  State,  ex  officio  Trustee  of  the  College  97 

Response  by  Governor  Bachelder 98 

The  Native  American,  for  whom  Dartmouth  College 

WAS  Founded loi 

Response  by  Dr.  Charles  Alexander  Eastman      .     .  102 
The  Relation  of  American  Education  to  the  English 

Universities 105 

Response  by  President  Charles  William  Eliot     .    .  106 
Yale  University:  The  Alma  Mater  of  Eleazar  Whee- 

LOCK 109 

Letter  from  President  Arthur  Twining  Hadley  .     .  109 
The   College   of   William   and    Mary  :   The   First   to 
Identify  Great   English   Names  with  American 

Institutions no 

Response  by  President  Lyon  Gardiner  Tyler    .     .     .  in 
Samuel    Kirkland,    Founder    of    Hamilton    College  : 
Eleazar  Wheelock's  Pupil  and  Fellow- Worker 

IN  Indian  Education 116 

Response  by  Hon.  Elihu  Root 116 


William  Heneage  Le(;ge 
Sixth  Earl  of  Dartmouth 


THE  PRESIDENT  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES 

The  President.  —  Gentlemen  :  I  bid  you  rise  to  the  first 
toast  of  the  evening  —  The  President  of  the  United  States. 
(The  toast  was  drunk  standing,  the  band  playing  "  The 
Star-spangled  Banner,"  and  was  followed  by  applause  and 
cheers.) 

HIS  MAJESTY  THE  KING  OF  ENGLAND 

The  President.  —  As  you  are  standing,  gentlemen,  I  bid 
you  respond  to  the  second  toast  of  the  evening — His 
Britannic  Majesty,  King  Edward  the  Seventh.  (The 
toast  was  drunk  standing,  the  band  playing  "God  Save 
the  King,"  and  was  followed  by  applause  and  cheers.) 

OUR  GUEST :  THE  EARL  OF  DARTMOUTH 

The  President.  —  It  is  a  very  difficult  thing  to  propose 
to  you.  Lord  Dartmouth,  a  formal  toast ;  you  have  so  sim- 
ply and  so  completely  won  our  hearts.  You  came  to  us 
bringing  with  you  the  traditions  of  your  great  house,  but 
you  will  always  stay  with  us,  in  your  own  person,  a  perma- 
nent part  of  the  life  of  this  College.  (Applause,  followed 
by  cheers  for  Lord  Dartmouth.)  I  was  saying  to  your 
Lordship  that  we  could  not  give  you  a  formal  toast ;  and 
yet  I  can  but  say,  in  behalf  of  this  College,  that  as  you 
go  out,  our  guest  —  yes,  I  say,  our  guest  from  the  other 
side  of  the  sea  —  we  wish  you  a  return  in  safety  and  in 
gladness ;  but  we  wish  you  never  to  forget  that  you  have 
won  a  home  for  you  and  for  yours  on  this  side  of  the  sea. 
(Applause.) 


80  DARTMOUTH   HALL  CORNER-STONE 

RESPONSE  BY  THE  EARL  OF  DARTMOUTH 

President  Tucker,  Your  Excellency,  and  Gentle- 
men: I  rise  to  return  you  my  very  sincere  thanks  for 
the  cordial  reception  you  have  given  me  to-night.  I  can 
assure  you  that  it  is  with  the  very  greatest  difficulty  that 
I  can  find  words  to  respond  to  the  toast  that  has  been 
submitted. 

We,  as  I  have  already  said  to-day,  will  never  forget  the 
very  cordial  and  hearty  reception  we  have  met  with  here ; 
and,  however  long  our  lives  may  last,  we  shall  always  keep 
the  tenderest  spot  in  our  hearts  for  those  of  the  family  — 
if  I  may  say  so  —  who  live  on  this  side  of  the  water. 
(Applause.) 

I  should  like,  if  I  might  be  allowed,  to  say  a  few  words 
to  you  to-night  in  regard  to  our  visit.  We  have  had 
many  experiences  of  the  pleasantest  kind  in  this  coun- 
try, but  I  am  bound  to  own  that  in  the  press  of  a  por- 
tion of  this  country  I  have  learned  facts  about  myself 
and  my  family  that  are  entirely  new  to  me.  (Laughter.) 
I  cannot  but  feel  that  the  poetic  aspiration  that  Heaven 
would  grant  us  the  "  gift  to  see  ourselves  as  others  see 
us  "  would  never  have  been  written  had  the  poet  Burns 
lived  in  the  days  of  the  modern  newspaper  and  the  kodak. 
(Laughter.) 

I  am  bound  to  own  that  one  of  the  paragraphs  I  have 
seen  has  caused  me  a  little  anxiety.  It  is  suggested  that, 
as  the  result  of  my  visit,  Dartmouth  College  will  begin  to 
drop  its  "  h's."  (Laughter.)  I  can  only  hope  that  no 
such  disaster  will  arise,  but  if  it  should,  and  if  anyone 
should  find  any  of  those  dropped  "  h's  "  lying  about,  if  he 
will  only  mail  them  across  to  me  on  the  other  side  of  the 
water  I  shall  always  treasure  them  as  souvenirs  of  a  pleas- 
ant and  most  interesting  visit.     (Laughter.) 


ADDRESSES   AT  THE  BANQUET  8 1 

Of  course,  gentlemen,  these  are  all  more  or  less  personal 
matters,  and  perhaps  we  ought  not  to  be  surprised  that 
others  do  not  form  the  same  opinion  of  our  appearance 
and  our  characteristics  as  we  hold  ourselves.  But  what 
has  surprised  me  more  than  anything  is  to  find  that  the 
history  of  Dartmouth  College  has  been  rewritten  from  the 
beginning;  and  when  I  see,  as  I  have  seen,  that  Dart- 
mouth College  is  situated  in  England,  that  it  is  a  rival  to 
the  great  sister  universities  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge, 
that  I  am  the  sixth  hereditary  patron,  and  that  it  was 
originally  started  to  teach  the  children  of  the  aristocracy 
in  England  to  read  and  write  (laughter),  I  am  bound  to 
confess  that  such  a  statement,  coming  suddenly  on  one, 
would  justify  not  merely  the  dropping  of  an  occasional  and 
harmless  "h,"  but  in  scattering  broadcast  the  whole  of  the 
alphabet.     (Laughter.) 

However,  on  figuring  out  things  I  am  able  to  locate  the 
occasion,  and  I  have  come  to  the  conclusion  that  that  mag- 
nificent flight  into  the  imaginary  emanated  from  the  brain 
of  a  reporter  of  the  gentler  sex.     (Laughter.) 

Gentlemen,  I  have  no  doubt  that  such  an  occasion  as 
this  would  suggest  the  desirability  of  contrasting  the  dif- 
ferent systems  of  education  of  this  country  and  at  home. 
But  I  am  relieved  from  that  duty,  because  I  find  that  there 
is  a  toast  lower  down  on  the  list  which  is  intrusted  to  a 
gentleman  who  is  perhaps  better  qualified  to  make  such 
comparison  than  anybody  else,  and  no  one  realizes  more 
fully  than  I  do  that  it  would  be  quite  beyond  my  powers 
to  endeavor  to  do  so.  In  fact,  I  think  I  may  admit — if 
you  will  see  that  it  does  not  go  any  farther  —  that  I  was 
somewhat  relieved  to-day  to  find  that  in  the  conferring  of 
the  degree  there  were  none  of  those  irritating  little  prelimi- 
naries in  the  shape  of  examinations  that  usually  precede 
the  taking  of  a  degree.     (Laughter.) 

6 


82  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

I  have  often  been  asked  during  my  journey  to  compare 
one  thing  with  another.  Personally,  I  object  to  these 
comparisons.  We  have  seen  a  great  many  beautiful 
things,  and  I  don't  know  that  we  any  of  us  reap  much 
advantage  by  comparing  them  with  others,  possibly  equally 
beautiful,  but  quite  different  in  character.  I  am  strength- 
ened in  that  opinion  by  an  answer  that  was  once  given  by 
the  late  Professor  Jowett,  whose  name  may  be  familiar  to 
some  of  you.  He  was  one  of  our  great  educationalists. 
He  was  for  a  long  time  Master  of  Balliol  College,  Oxford, 
and  he  had  a  caustic  wit  that  those  who  came  under  the 
lash  of  it  did  not  readily  forget.  He  was  visiting  one  of 
our  English  seaside  resorts.  In  the  party  was  an  enthu- 
siastic young  lady  who,  as  enthusiastic  young  ladies  some- 
times do,  had  lost  that  sense  of  proportion  that  ought  to 
form  a  considerable  part  of  our  anatomy.  She  went  up  to 
the  professor  and  she  said :  "  Oh,  Professor,  is  not  this 
beautiful  ?  Does  it  not  remind  you  of  Switzerland  ? "  The 
professor  thought  a  moment,  and  then  said :  "  Yes,  Madam, 
it  is  very  beautiful,  and  to  some  extent  it  does  remind  me 
of  Switzerland,  except  that  here  there  are  no  mountains 
and  there  there  is  no  sea."     (Laughter.) 

Again,  gentlemen,  I  am  often  asked  what  impressions 
are  made  upon  me  by  this  country.  Well,  my  impressions 
are  varied,  and  are  at  present  so  confused  that  it  would  be 
impossible  for  me  to  give  them  at  any  length.  But  the 
one  impression  I  have  formed  in  this  country  is  that,  large 
as  it  is,  there  is  no  room  for  anything  but  admiration  and 
most  hearty  congratulation  on  the  wonderful  progress  that 
has  been  made. 

I  remember  not  very  long  ago  a  speech  that  was  deliv- 
ered by  Mr.  Joseph  H.  Choate,  at  a  time  when  the  rela- 
tions between  the  two  countries  had  been  considerably 
improved.     A  good  deal  was  said  on  that  occasion.     Mr. 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  83 

Choate  gave  a  warning  note.  He  said  that  "  no  man  could 
be  an  Englishman  and  an  American  at  the  same  time."  I 
take  it  that  he  meant  by  that  that  where  the  interests  of 
two  countries  come  into  conflict,  whatever  the  sentiment 
may  be,  no  country  will  allow  its  interests  to  suffer  merely 
on  the  ground  of  sentiment.  But  what  I  believe  and  what 
I  hope  to  be  the  case  is,  that  by  a  better  knowledge  of  each 
other,  by  mutual  respect  for  each  other,  by  mutual  recog- 
nition of  each  other's  good  qualities,  which  are  many,  and 
mutual  forbearance  with  regard  to  each  other's  weaknesses 
which  may  exist,  when  the  interests  do  clash  the  govern- 
ments of  the  two  countries  will  be  able  to  find  a  solu- 
tion of  those  questions  that  will  be  mutually  satisfactory. 
(Great  applause.) 

Gentlemen,  may  I  say  one  or  two  words  of  a  purely  per- 
sonal nature  ?  I  once  heard  a  speech  delivered  by  Mark 
Twain.  He  gave  his  views  on  heredity,  and  commenced 
his  speech  by  relating  a  little  incident  that  had  happened 
to  himself.  He  was  present  at  a  luncheon  in  London,  at 
which  was  also  present  one  of  our  eminent  divines,  who 
had  an  early  engagement  and  had  to  leave  before  the  rest 
of  the  company.  According  to  Mark  Twain,  the  reverend 
divine  naturally  took  the  best  hat  he  could  find,  which  was 
Mark  Twain's,  and  from  this  very  ordinary  occurrence  Mark 
Twain  came  to  the  sweeping  conclusion  that  he  would  not 
trust  any  ancestor  with  a  hat  or  anything  else.  (Laughter.) 
In  England  we  perhaps  take  rather  a  different  view  of 
heredity,  and  I  would  venture  to  say  that  Mark  Twain's 
hat,  even  if  it  was  as  good  a  one  as  he  claimed  it  to  have 
been,  would  have  been  as  safe  in  the  hands  —  or,  perhaps 
I  should  say,  on  the  head  —  of  an  ancestor  as  anywhere 
else.  And  personally,  descended  as  I  am  on  the  one  side 
from  the  father  of  the  first  Lord  Dartmouth,  who  was 
known  among  his  contemporaries  as  "  Honest  Will,"  who 


84        DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

was  described  by  his  sovereign,  Charles  the  First,  as  the 
faithfuUest  servant  that  ever  king  had,  and  on  the  other 
from  Elizabeth  Washington,  a  great-grand-aunt  of  George 
Washington,  who  holds  the  world's  record  for  truth  and 
honor  (laughter  and  applause),  I  trust  that  I  shall  not  be 
blamed  if  at  any  rate  I  hope  that  there  may  be  something 
in  heredity.     (Laughter.) 

Gentlemen,  what  is  our  connection  but  hereditary?  I  am 
the  first  of  our  family  that  has  ever  had  the  privilege  of 
meeting  the  members  of  Dartmouth  College  face  to  face 
and  shaking  them  by  the  hand.  But  these  friendly  rela- 
tions have  been  handed  down  from  father  to  son  now  to  the 
fifth  generation;  and,  standing  as  we  do  on  the  platform  of 
the  present,  with  the  great  past  behind  us  and  with  the 
still  greater  future  before  us,  I  think  we  may  congratulate 
ourselves  on  that  instance  of  heredity,  and  trust  that  it 
may  last  for  many  generations  to  come.     (Applause.) 

Gentlemen,  President  Tucker  is  the  head  of  the  Dart- 
mouth family  over  here,  as  I  am  the  head  of  the  Dartmouth 
family  in  the  old  country.  His  family  is  a  larger  one  than 
mine  (laughter),  and  I  do  not  say  this  with  any  feeling  of 
envy  or  regret.  (Laughter.)  At  any  rate,  I  believe  that 
in  one  particular,  at  least.  President  Tucker's  hopes  and 
desires  are  identical  with  mine.  I  believe  the  earnest  de- 
sire and  hope  of  us  both  is  that  the  sons  of  Dartmouth, 
whether  they  be  many  or  whether  they  be  few,  whether 
they  live  on  one  side  of  the  Atlantic  or  whether  they 
live  on  the  other,  shall  be  trained  up  to  be  useful,  hon- 
orable, God-fearing  men  and  worthy  citizens  of  the  two 
great  nations  to  which  they  respectively  belong.  (Great 
applause  and  cheering,  followed  by  a  selection  by  the  Glee 
Club.) 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  85 


THE   DARTMOUTH   AND    THE   WASHINGTON    ARMS 

The  President.  —  I  have  in  mind,  gentlemen,  a  home  of 
many  sons,  into  which  there  came  a  boy  of  whom,  after  he 
had  been  tried  and  tested,  the  mother  said,  "  I  cannot  tell 
him  from  the  sons  I  bore."  Such,  gentlemen,  is  the  word 
which  the  mother  of  us  all  bids  me  speak  to-night  to 
Charles  Theodore  Gallagher.     (Applause.) 


RESPONSE   BY  THE   HONORABLE   CHARLES 
THEODORE   GALLAGHER 

Mr.  President,  Your  Excellency,  Your  Lordship: 
It  was  a  fortunate  happening,  indeed,  in  1889  when  Mr. 
Waters,  the  eminent  genealogist,  found  folded  in  the  will  of 
one  Andrew  Knowling,  of  about  1649,  a  piece  of  paper 
three  inches  long  and  from  one  and  one-half  to  two  inches 
wide,  written  over  with  Latin,  which  formed  the  link  that 
made  the  chain  complete  between  the  Washingtons  of 
America  and  the  Washingtons  of  England.  Considered 
in  connection  with  its  consequences  this  was  a  most  im- 
portant discovery,  having  for  its  result  not  only  the  definite 
settlement  of  the  line  of  our  own  great  Washington's  ances- 
try, but  the  establishing  of  direct  connection  between  his 
family  and  that  of  our  honored  guest,  and  incidentally  the 
presence  for  the  first  time  in  history  of  an  illustrious  mem- 
ber of  the  Dartmouth  family  as  a  guest  of  the  College. 

It  is  with  some  feeling  of  responsibility  that  I  approach 
the  sentiment  of  "  The  Dartmouth  and  Washington  Arms," 
and  had  my  own  wishes  been  regarded,  some  other  and 
better  representative  would  stand  before  you  for  that  pur- 
pose. I  should  be  false  to  every  sensibility,  however,  if  in 
responding  to  the  sentiment,  I  failed  to  acknowledge  the 
compliment  of  being  placed  in  this  position  by  command 


86        DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

of  our  President,  and  then  by  his  introduction,  being 
received  into  a  fellowship  more  fully  emphasized  in  cordial- 
ity, if  possible,  than  the  kindness  and  generosity  of  the 
Dartmouth  graduate  toward  me  in  the  past.  The  expecta- 
tions that  such  a  presentation  naturally  evokes,  however, 
but  add  to  my  embarrassment,  when  I  contemplate  an 
attempt  "  to  dim  the  eye  or  tremble  the  lip  "  on  the  con- 
struction of  a  bare  skeleton  of  genealogical  details  that 
shall  have  for  its  end  an  interesting  tree  for  Dartmouth 
purposes,  but  falling  far  short  of  the  demands  of  an  after- 
dinner  speech. 

The  most  that  was  known  of  George  Washington's  an- 
cestry was  that  John  Washington  came  here  from  England ; 
and  for  one  hundred  years  antiquarians  had  been  unable  to 
connect  him  with  the  old  country.  Finding  this  piece  of 
paper  in  the  Knowling  will  identified  the  missing  Lawrence 
Washington,  temporary  Surrogate  of  the  Archdeacon's 
court,  the  Rector  of  Purleigh,  an  M.A.  of  Brasenose  Col- 
lege, at  one  time  Proctor  of  Oxford  University,  as  the  fifth 
son  of  Lawrence  Washington  of  Sulgrave,  and  as  the  father 
of  John  Washington,  who  emigrated  to  Virginia. 

Starting  with  Lawrence  Washington  of  Sulgrave,  we 
have  on  the  English  side  Sir  William  Washington,  his  son, 
whose  daughter  Elizabeth  married  William  Legge,  referred 
to  by  his  Lordship,  and  known  in  history  as  "  Honest 
Will "  Legge,  a  description  of  whose  life  during  manhood 
might  almost  be  called  a  history  of  England  ;  closely  allied 
with  the  royal  households  of  Charles  L  and  IL  and  enjoy- 
ing a  reputation  for  loyalty  to  his  sovereign  almost  unsur- 
passed in  history,  he  maintained  during  those  uncertain 
times  "  so  general  a  reputation  of  integrity  and  fidelity  "  as 
to  attract  the  attention  of  the  historian  and  the  world  by 
the  complimentary  title  given  to  him  here.  Taken  prisoner 
no  less  than  eight  times,  and  wounded  many  more  times 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  87 

while  fighting  the  battles  of  his  sovereigns,  returning  once 
from  a  safe  escape  to  Dieppe  to  share  the  imprisonment 
and  escape  of  his  king  from  Hampton  Court  and  his  subse- 
quent recapture  and  confinement,  his  modesty  declined  the 
proffered  knighthood,  expressing  the  hope,  however,  that 
his  son  might  live  to  enjoy  it. 

This  distinction  did  come  to  his  son  George  Legge,  who 
was  made  a  baron  in  1681 ;  his  creation  reading:  ''That 
his  Majesty  remembering  the  great  merits  of  William 
Legge,  etc."  This  first  Baron,  however,  well  earned  the 
distinction  that  was  accorded  him,  for  his  life  is  replete 
with  deeds  of  valor,  loyalty,  and  heroism  both  on  land  and 
sea.  His  destruction  of  Tangiers  occupies  a  notable  place 
in  history  as  a  military  achievement,  while  his  naval  ser- 
vice, beginning  with  the  command  of  a  man-of-war  at  the 
age  of  twenty,  progressed  until  he  was  '*  admiral  of  the 
whole  fleet "  and  fought  De  Ruyter  and  Van  Tromp,  and 
was  despatched  by  James  to  intercept  the  fleet  of  the  Prince 
of  Orange.  The  latter  on  his  accession  failing  to  appreciate 
at  first  the  distinction,  so  logically  put  by  the  admiral  in 
the  Dartmouth  manuscripts  published  by  the  commission, 
of  which  our  guest  is  an  honored  member, between  obedience 
to  one's  king  and  loyalty  to  one's  country,  caused  the 
admiral  to  be  sent  to  the  Tower,  where  he  died  suddenly, 
as  King  William  was  about  to  release  him,  being  convinced 
of  his  innocence  and  of  his  loyalty  to  his  country.  By  royal 
command  the  admiral's  funeral  was  celebrated  with  great 
respect  and  pomp,  among  other  ceremonials  a  salute  being 
fired  from  the  Tower  guns  in  his  honor.  Immediately  fol- 
lowing, a  pension  of  ;£"  1,000  was  continued  to  his  son,  who 
was  created  an  earl  in  171 1,  and  made  secretary  of  state. 
And  in  him  we  have  William,  the  first  Earl  of  Dartmouth. 

The  son  of  the  first  Earl  dying  in  1732,  before  his  father, 
the  line  was  continued  to  the  grandson  of  the  first  Earl  on 


88  DARTMOUTH   HALL   CORNER-STONE 

his  death  in  1750,  and  thus  we  have  William,  the  second 
Earl  of  Dartmouth,  and  founder  of  Dartmouth  College.  He 
has  been  described  to  you  to-day  so  eloquently  by  the 
historian  that  he  should  receive  but  a  passing  remark  from 
me ;  but  he  was  the  great  friend  of  the  American  colonies 
during  the  War  of  the  Revolution ;  he  was  the  man  to 
whom  Bowdoin,  Pemberton,  and  Joseph  Warren  appealed 
that  the  troops  be  removed  from  Boston ;  whom  Sam 
Adams  characterized  as  the  "  good  Lord  Dartmouth  "  and 
speaks  of  his  **  greatness  of  mind ;  "  and  whose  appoint- 
ment as  Secretary  of  State  for  the  American  Department 
"was  received  in  America  with  general  joy,  the  greatest 
hopes  being  placed  on  his  high  character,  etc."  Dr. 
Franklin  said  of  him :  "  Yes,  there  is  Lord  Dartmouth,  we 
liked  him  very  well  when  he  was  head  of  the  board  formerly, 
and  probably  should  like  him  again  ;  "  and  tells  of  attending 
Lord  Dartmouth's  first  lev6e  and  of  the  gratification  at  the 
reception,  which  was  so  different  from  that  of  the  previous 
secretary.  Thomas  Gushing,  speaker  of  the  Massachusetts 
Assembly,  to  whom  Lord  Dartmouth  wrote  for  information 
directly,  instead  of  to  the  governor  of  the  colonies,  wrote 
to  Arthur  Lee  in  1773 :  "  I  have  lately  been  honored  with 
a  letter  from  his  Lordship.  His  sentiments  are  truly  noble 
and  generous.  .  .  .  He  seems  disposed  and  desirous  of 
having  union  and  harmony  restored  between  the  two 
countries  upon  a  fair,  candid,  and  equitable  footing." 

Not  only  in  America  but  in  England  were  his  position 
and  character  felt.  The  Duke  of  Grafton  spoke  of  him  as 
the  only  one  who  had  a  "  true  desire  to  see  lenient  means 
adopted  toward  the  colonies,"  while  Sir  George  Trevelyan 
characterized  him  as  one  who  was  "  too  good  for  the  post 
which  he  held,"  and  again  says  that  the  "  colonists  who 
hated  the  rest  of  the  cabinet  trusted  and  liked  him."  In 
fact  the  last  act  of  the  administration  of  the  second  Earl 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  89 

was  to  present  to  his  Majesty  the  "  Olive  Branch  petition," 
of  which  Franklin  says :  "  He  told  us  it  was  a  decent  and 
proper  petition,  and  cheerfully  undertook  to  deliver  it." 
His  every  act  was  for  conciliation,  until  the  unfortunate 
Gaspee  affair  in  Rhode  Island,  which  has  been  spoken  of 
as  "  five  times  the  magnitude  of  the  Stamp  Act,"  and  after 
this  occurrence  no  man,  however  strong,  could  stem  the 
tide  against  the  whole  cabinet. 

He  was  one  of  the  few  men  in  England  who  understood 
the  American  people.  From  the  Dartmouth  country,  the 
counties  of  Devonshire  and  Somerset,  the  men  of  New 
England  had  gone  from  Old  England  to  find  new  homes, 
carrying  their  loyal  remembrances  so  far  as  to  reproduce 
all  over  the  new  land  the  names  of  the  towns  and  cities 
which  they  had  left  at  home. 

An  additional  bond  of  union  between  them  was  their 
simple  religious  faith  ;  while  Lord  Dartmouth  remained  a 
communicant  of  the  Church  of  England,  his  drawing-rooms 
at  Cheltenham  were  open  to  Whitefield,  Wesley,  Toplady, 
and  others,  earning  for  himself  the  title  of  "  the  Daniel  of 
the  age,"  and  immortalized  in  the  verse  of  Cowper  as  **  one 
who  wears  a  coronet  and  prays." 

It  is  not  strange  that  his  sympathies  and  attention  were 
drawn  to  the  establishing  of  a  school  for  civilizing  the 
Indians  near  the  geographical  center  of  New  England  in 
1769,  or  that  he  was  selected  by  Lord  Sheldon  as  agent 
plenipotentiary  to  negotiate  the  Treaty  of  Paris  in  1782, 
each  act  bearing  testimony  to  the  relations  in  which  he 
stood  toward  the  colonies  and  the  American  people. 

His  arms,  reproduced  in  brilliant  coloring  and  attested 
by  the  Bluemantle  pursuivant  of  arms  of  the  Herald's 
College  at  London,  with  the  heraldic  description  of  the 
same  from  the  peerage,  occupy  a  prominent  position  to-day 
in   the   exhibition   at   the   Howe   Library,  while  colored 


90  DARTMOUTH   HALL   CORNER-STONE 

lithographs  have  been  circulated  among  the  alumni  and 
adorn  the  walls  of  library,  home,  or  office  of  many  of  you 
at  present;  and  from  this  day  forward  they  will  be  looked 
at  with  a  new  light,  a  new  affection,  and  a  new  significance, 
in  the  appreciation  of  and  respect  for  the  Dartmouth  name 
and  family  you  already  hold. 

Returning  now  to  Lawrence  Washington  of  Sulgrave,  the 
common  ancestor  of  the  Dartmouth  and  Washington  line, 
his  fifth  son  was  a  brother  of  Sir  William  Washington,  the 
father  of  Elizabeth  Legge,  and,  by  the  chance  discovery  of 
Mr.  Waters,  was  located  as  the  missing  Rector  of  Purleigh, 
and  is  thus  placed  in  the  direct  line  connecting  the  Vir- 
ginia Washingtons  with  the  Sulgrave  branch  in  England. 
For  it  was  John,  the  son  of  this  Lawrence  Washington, 
Rector  of  Purleigh,  that  emigrated  to  Virginia  and  became 
the  founder  and  only  known  head  of  the  family  for  more 
than  two  hundred  years.  His  son,  another  Lawrence,  was 
father  of  Augustine,  who,  by  his  marriage  with  Mary  Ball, 
had  for  issue  the  immortal  patriot  and  father  of  our  repub- 
lic, George  Washington. 

Providence  vouchsafed  to  the  second  Earl  of  Dartmouth, 
who  (if  we  omit  his  father,  who  died  without  succeeding) 
stands  in  the  same  degree  to  the  propositus  (Lawrence  of 
Sulgrave)  as  does  George  Washington,  that  his  successors 
through  four  generations  should  add  to  the  dignity  and 
strength  of  the  mother  country,  and  that  we  should  enjoy 
the  fruits  of  a  succession  in  being  enabled  to  pay  respect 
and  homage  to  one  of  the  line  who  has  come  to  grace  this 
occasion  by  his  presence.  But  to  Washington,  though,  as 
was  said  of  William  the  Silent,  "  He  lived  the  faithful 
ruler  of  a  brave  people,  and  when  he  died,  children  cried 
in  the  streets,"  nature  so  ordered  that  he  left  no  issue. 
But  as  a  compensation  it  may  be  added  that,  "  Heaven  left 
him  childless  that  all  the  nation  might  call  him  Father." 


iTJSTH 


.V<i.''.n™^i.r  .- 


■.»fi«?«TSK1«f 


Arms  of  the  Second  Earl  of  Dartmouth 


^  OFTHC 

VNtVERSti 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  9 1 

The  Washington  arms,  popularly  known  as  a  shield  with 
three  stars  above  and  three  bars  below,  and  heraldically 
read  as  **  Argent,  two  bars  and  in  chief  three  mullets- 
gules,"  have  been  reproduced  by  copy  from  escutcheons 
and  tombstones  in  England  and  placed  in  public  in  our  own 
country ;  our  honored  guest  detecting  one  on  a  tablet  near 
the  statue  of  Washington  at  our  State  House  in  Boston, 
heretofore  unnoticed  by  myself  in  the  many  times  I  had 
passed  the  spot. 

If  read  by  their  symbols,  the  arms  of  the  family  would 
develop  the  fact  that  there  were  navigators  among  them, 
and  at  one  time  "  a  prince  had  built  a  fortification  for  his 
sovereign,"  indicating  the  profession  of  arms.  George 
Washington's  life  was  consistent  with  the  family  arms, 
for,  inheriting  through  a  succession  of  generations  a  taste 
for  the  sea,  he  yielded  reluctantly  a  commission  in  the 
navy  at  his  mother's  urgent  request,  while  as  a  military 
genius  and  great  commander  his  fame  is  historical. 

His  taste  for  agriculture  led  him  to  bend  his  shield  to  a 
cornucopia,  however,  and  to  foliate  it  with  wheat  and  the 
products  of  the  farm ;  it  was  in  that  form  you  saw  it 
extended  on  the  canvas  last  evening  with  his  motto  and 
signature. 

Without  disposing  of  the  question  as  to  the  origin  of  the 
stars  and  stripes  on  our  national  flag,  we  may  take  pride 
in  the  feeling  that  Washington  placed  the  six  white  stripes 
on  the  red  ground  of  England's  flag  at  the  siege  of  Boston, 
and  saluted  his  thirteen  stripes  with  thirteen  guns  in  honor 
of  the  thirteen  colonies;  it  is  significant  too  that  when 
Congress  created  the  flag,  adding  ''  the  new  constellation 
of  thirteen  stars  on  a  blue  field,"  the  heraldic  star  of  six 
points  was  not  employed,  but  the  five-pointed  mullet  of 
the  Washington  arms ;  and  the  men  who  did  it  had  some 
knowledge  of  heraldry.     But  more  conclusive  to  us  will  be 


92  DARTMOUTH   HALL   CORNER-STONE 

the  expression  of  our  distinguished  guest  who,  over  his 
own  signature,  has  expressed  pride  in  the  fact  that  he  has 
the  right  to  quarter  his  Dartmouth  arms  with  the  stars 
and  stripes  ;  an  expression  as  pleasing  to  us  as  his  corre- 
spondence on  Dartmouth  College  matters,  when,  as  long 
ago  as  1897,  h^  wrote  on  the  occasion  of  a  Boston  alumni 
dinner :  "  May  I,  as  the  head  of  the  family,  and  a  direct 
lineal  descendant  of  Elizabeth  Washington,  the  great-great- 
aunt  of  George,  although  a  stranger,  except  in  name,  very 
heartily  reciprocate  your  good  wishes  for  the  ensuing 
year,"  closing  his  letter  with  that  cry  so  dear  and  familiar 
to  us  all,  "  Wah  !  Who  !  Wah  !  —  Wah  !  Who  !  Wah  ! 
Da-di-di-Dartmouth  — Wah  !  Who  !  Wah  !  "  learned  by  him 
from  a  relative  who  had  it  from  American  college  men  in 
England  at  one  of  the  international  athletic  meets. 

You  have  given  me  the  sentiment  of  "  arms,"  —  I  com- 
plete the  sentence,  "  and  the  man."  And  we  look  up  to 
him  who  by  the  union  of  "  The  Dartmouth  and  Washington 
arms  "  finds  himself  among  us,  not  only  to  him  as  the 
noble  earl  and  distinguished  Englishman,  but  in  that 
higher  and  nobler  character  which  knows  no  geographical 
limitations,  the  consummation  of  the  poet  and  the  thinker, 
as  a  man.     For 

"  There  is  neither  East  nor  West, 
Border  nor  breed  nor  birth, 
When  two  strong  men  stand  face  to  face, 
Though  they  come  from  the  ends  of  the  earth." 

And  as  for  months  the  men  of  Dartmouth  have  antici- 
pated the  pleasure  of  a  cordial  welcome  to  him,  so  have 
the  ladies  of  the  faculty  vied  with  each  other  in  their  zeal 
to  present  to  his  gracious  wife  and  charming  daughter 
some  token  of  their  appreciation  and  consideration.  About 
us  on  every  hand  at  these  extensive  tables  are  strewn  the 
rich  glow  and  coloring  of  our  New  England  hill  autumn. 


Washington's  Book-Plate  and  Arms 


^   OF  TH., 

VNIVERSI 


ADDRESSES   AT  THE  BANQUET  93 

Carefully  plucked  weeks  since,  when  in  their  richness,  and 
preserved  and  pressed,  wired  and  arranged,  they  have  been 
added  to  this  festal  occasion  as  a  speaking  tribute  for  the 
party  who  grace  the  occasion.  All  honor,  then,  to  the 
ladies  whose  fair  hands  have  enriched  our  decorations,  and 
a  royal  welcome  to  those  whose  presence  is  thus  recog- 
nized by  their  act. 

I  have  said  that  the  Dartmouth  and  Washington  arms 
are  united  in  our  presence.  On  imperishable  marble  on 
the  tablet  to  the  memory  of  William  Legge  —  the  "  Hon- 
est Will  "  of  his  Lordship  and  of  history  —  placed  on  the 
wall  of  the  Church  of  the  Holy  Trinity  in  the  Minories  at 
London,  is  the  escutcheon  of  Dartmouth  with  its  stag's  head, 
impaled  by  the  stars  and  bars  of  the  Washington  arms ;  and 
as  that  is  preserved  in  stone  and  story  in  old  England,  so 
we  in  New  England  will  ever  retain  in  our  hearts,  so  indeii 
bly  as  never  to  be  effaced,  the  union  of  the  same  names  in 
him  who  has  made  so  deep  an  impress  on  all  our  hearts. 

And  this  lasting  remembrance,  thus  impressed  in  the 
hearts  of  the  alumni  and  students  of  an  institution  of 
learning  that  has  for  its  aim  ''  to  give  to  opinion  a  loftier 
seat,"  will  find  their  work  and  hope  in  life  enlarged  and 
broadened  and  strengthened  by  such  an  association  as 
this,  short  in  duration  but  permanent  in  its  effects.  And 
if  by  his  visit  his  Lordship  shall  have  given  a  new  impetus 
to  the  advancement  of  the  cause  of  learning  and  good  cit- 
izenship, we  may  with  him  be  proud  indeed  of  the  asso- 
ciation, and  grateful  for  his  encouragement. 

But  *•  let  the  strain  soar  higher."  If  his  visit,  like  those 
of  other  distinguished  Englishmen,  shall  have  the  ef- 
fect of  cementing  more  firmly  that  bond  between  these 
two  great  nations  of  a  common  language  and  a  common 
hope,  then  indeed  may  we  feel  that  "  great  things  have 
been  done  this  day."     And  as  England  and  America,  with 


94  DARTMOUTH   HALL   CORNER-STONE 

constitutional  liberty  and  representative  government  form- 
ing the  fundamental  principles  of  their  civilization,  join  in 
the  forward  march  of  progress  and  advancement  in  civil, 
political,  and  moral  life,  the  nations  of  the  world  will  feel 
the  beneficent  influence  ;  and  the  twentieth  century,  feeling 
the  effect  of  these  humanizing  examples,  will  look  back  upon 
the  material  progress  of  its  predecessor  and  feel  that  the 
new  influence  has  grandly  supplemented  the  success  of 
the  old. 

And  if  these  united  influences  shall  extend  beyond  the 
confines  of  a  protected  and  policed  civilization  and  work  for 
good  among  the  less  favored  of  humanity,  then  indeed  in 
a  grander  spirit  may  the  dream  of  Dr.  Wheelock  and  the 
hope  of  the  second  Earl  find  fruition  in  a  more  humane  treat- 
ment of  the  barbarous  and  savage  peoples  of   the  earth. 

The  great  civilization  of  these  two  English-speaking 
people  in  the  past  has  been  achieved  by  the  strong  minds 
and  noble  hearts  of  her  men  ;  "  large-hearted,  manly  men," 
such  as  the  training  of  the  Dartmouth  family  in  England 
and  of  Dartmouth  College  in  America  have  placed  before 
the  world.  And  that  the  problems  of  the  future  may  be 
worked  out  similarly  by  the  good  and  true  men  of  like 
production  in  the  families  and  colleges  of  a  united  civi- 
lization, is  our  fervent  and  earnest  prayer.  For  in  this 
work  of  developing  men 

"  Who  shall  join  the  chorus, 
And  prolong  the  psalm  of  labor  and  the  song  of  love  " 

we  shall  need  "  Heroes,   who  shall  struggle  in  the  solid 
ranks  of  truth,"  and 

"  Scholars  who  shall  shape 
The  doubtful  questions  of  dubious  years, 
And  land  the  Ark  that  bears  (each)  country's  good 
Safe  to  some  peaceful  Ararat  at  last." 

(Applause.) 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  95 

THE   DARTMOUTH   PEDIGREE 

The  following  pedigree,  used  by  Mr.  Gallagher  in  his 
address,  shows  the  relationship  of  Elizabeth  Legge  to 
George  Washington  : 

Lawrence  Washington  —  Margaret  Butler, 
of  Sulgrave 
died  1 61 6 


Sir  William  Washington — Anne  Villiers  Lawrence  Washington — Amphilis 


died  1643  I  ^-  A.,  Rector  of 

Purleigh ; 
identified  in  1889 


(Roades  ?) 


William  Legge  —  Elizabeth  Washington    John  Washington — Ann  Pope 

emigrated  to 
Virginia 


George  Legge,  C  ol .  &  Admiral           Lawrence  Washington — Mildred  Warner 
^1  Baron  1681  | 

I                                                                        I 
William  Legge,  Second  Baron,  created    Augustine  Washington — Mary  Ball 
Viscount  Lewisham  & 
First  Earl  Sept.  5,  17 11  


Son,  died  1732,  during  life  of  George  Washington 

First  Earl 


William,  —  grandson  of  First  Earl 
succeeded  on  death  of 
grandfather,  1750,  and 
became  Second  Earl 


By  this  it  will  be  seen  that  George  Washington  and 
Elizabeth  Legge  were  first  cousins  three  times  removed ; 
and,  therefore,  Elizabeth's  uncle,  Lawrence  Washington, 
was  the  great-great-grandfather  of  the  Father  of  the 
American  Republic. 


96  DARTMOUTH   HALL  CORNER-STONE 

LETTER   FROM  THE   BRITISH   AMBASSADOR 

The  President.  —  It  had  been  our  confident  expectation 
that  his  Excellency,  the  British  Ambassador,  would  be 
with  us  on  this  occasion,  and  it  was  not  until  last  week 
that  we  learned  that  he  would  be  deprived  of  the  oppor- 
tunity of  paying  his  respects  to  Lord  Dartmouth.  At  that 
time  I  wrote  asking  that  a  representative  of  the  British 
Ambassador  might  take  his  place,  and  I  received  this  letter 
in  reply :  — 

British  Embassy 
Washington 

Lenox,  Mass., 

19th  Oct.,  1904, 

My  Dear  Sir  :  —  I  have  received  your  letter  of  the  17  th  and 
very  much  wish  I  could  meet  your  views  about  the  26th.  It  was 
with  greatest  reluctance  that  I  had  to  ask  you  to  excuse  me.  But 
the  fact  is  that  I  have  found  myself  obliged  to  start  on  a  journey 
to  Chicago  and  St.  Louis  earlier  than  I  intended,  and  to  break  up 
the  Embassy  here. 

Our  last  Foreign  Office  bag  comes  in  on  the  24th,  and  from  that 
date  until  the  28th  will  be  precisely  the  time  when  we  shall  be 
most  occupied —  while  I  have  just  lost  two  of  the  secretaries  of  the 
Embassy.  It  would  therefore  be  peculiarly  inconvenient  to  send 
away  any  one  for  the  25  th  and  26th. 

I  am  very  sorry,  for  I  should  have  much  liked  to  meet  Lord 
Dartmouth  myself,  and  failing  that  to  be  represented  at  the  cere- 
monial. But  I  do  not  see  my  way  to  either.  I  have  also  had  to 
give  up  a  projected  visit  to  Boston,  which  I  much  wished  to  see. 

I  remain 

Yours  very  truly, 

h.  m.  durand. 
The  President, 

Dartmouth  College.  (Applause.) 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  9/ 


TELEGRAM   FROM   MR.    EDWARD  TUCK 

The  President  —  I  will  also  read  the  following  telegram, 
just  received  from  Paris  :  — 

President  Tucker,  Hanover,  N.  H. 

Regret  cannot  be  with  you  for  ceremonies  of  to-day.  May  the 
New  Dartmouth  Hall  gather  in  the  coming  years  associations  as 
rich  as  those  connected  with  the  old,  and  may  to-day's  events 
mark  a  new  epoch  of  progress  and  prosperity  for  the  College. 

Edward  Tuck. 
(Applause.) 


THE  COMMONWEALTH  AND  THE  COLLEGE:  THE 
GOVERNOR  OF  THE  STATE,  EX  OFFICIO  TRUS- 
TEE  OF  THE  COLLEGE 

The  President.  —  During  the  past  three  or  four  years 
there  has  been  a  good  deal  of  discussion  in  the  educational 
world  about  shortening  the  college  course.  Some  of  us 
have  had  some  anxiety  about  the  result,  and  here  in  New 
Hampshire  we  have  been  not  a  little  disturbed  for  fear 
that  we  might  suffer  from  contagion  from  the  political  cur- 
riculum, —  as  it  has  now  become  the  established  habit  of 
New  Hampshire  to  graduate  Governors  once  in  two  years. 
(Laughter  and  applause.)  The  corresponding  advantage, 
however,  of  that  habit,  as  we  have  experience  of  it,  is  that 
we  have  brought  into  our  company,  into  our  fellowship,  a 
very  notable  group  of  New  Hampshire  citizens ;  and  the 
traditions  of  that  office  seem  to  be  such  that,  as  they 
are  passed  on  from  one  to  another,  a  certain  loyalty  be- 
tween the  State  and  the  College  is  more  conspicuously 
developed. 

During  my  term  of  office  in  connection  with  the  College 
I  have  known  the  Governors  of  the  State  and  their  intcn- 

7 


98  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

tions  toward  the  College,  and,  in  regard  to  those  of  the 
past,  their  intentions  have  been  marked  by  their  deeds. 
That  is  true  of  our  present  Governor.  (Applause.)  The 
policy  established  by  the  State  has  been  maintained,  and 
no  man  is  more  welcome  at  our  board  at  any  time  than  the 
Governor  of  the  State  of  New  Hampshire.  No  man  is 
more  welcome  to-night  than  His  Excellency,  our  present 
Governor.     (Applause  and  cheers.) 


RESPONSE   BY   GOVERNOR   BACHELDER. 

Mr.  President,  Your  Lordship,  Men  of  Dartmouth  : 
I  thank  you  for  .your  cordial  greeting,  a  greeting  invariably 
extended  by  the  men  of  Dartmouth  to  the  Governor  of 
New  Hampshire,  whoever  he  may  be. 

It  is  with  no  little  embarrassment  that  I  rise  upon  this 
occasion  to  speak  even  in  the  briefest  manner.  My  em- 
barrassment was  somewhat  increased  to-day  by  the  face- 
tious remark  of  a  friend  who  reminded  me  of  the  fact  that 
I  was  only  an  adopted  son  of  Dartmouth,  my  connection 
depending  upon  the  slender  thread  of  an  honorary  degree 
conferred  by  the  Trustees  of  this  institution.  I  reminded 
him  of  the  adopted  child  who  was  taunted  by  his  asso- 
ciates with  being  only  an  adopted  child.  He  replied,  "  It 
is  true  that  I  am  an  adopted  child,  but  when  you  appeared 
in  your  parents'  family  they  were  obliged  to  take  you  as 
you  came.  I  was  selected  from  seventy-five."  (Applause 
and  laughter.)  I  also  remarked  to  him  that  President 
Tucker  was  obliged  to  accept  those  who  applied  for  admis- 
sion to  the  College  if  mentally  and  morally  qualified  and 
do  the  best  he  could  with  them,  but  that  I  flattered  myself 
that  I  was  selected  from  420,000  citizens  of  the  State. 
(Laughter.) 

I  am  also  impressed  by  the  magnitude  of  the  College 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  99 

and  the  relative  magnitude  of  the  State.  Dartmouth  Col- 
lege has  grown  so  fast  in  recent  years  that  it  is  not  a  part 
of  the  State  of  New  Hampshire  any  more,  but  the  State  of 
New  Hampshire  is  a  part  of  Dartmouth  College.  (Laugh- 
ter.) A  traveller  in  Germany  had  occasion  to  send  a 
cablegram,  and  addressed  it  to  New  Hampshire,  forgetting 
to  add  the  name  of  the  country.  The  operator  called  his 
attention  to  the  omission  and  asked  him  for  the  location  of 
New  Hampshire.  *'0h,"  he  replied,  **New  Hampshire  is 
near  Dartmouth  College."  (Laughter.)  That  located  it 
upon  the  map  of  the  world. 

We  are  assembled  to-day  upon  perhaps  the  most  impor- 
tant occasion  in  the  history  of  the  Commonwealth  and  the 
history  of  the  College.  Both  the  Commonwealth  and  the 
College  are  honored  by  the  presence  of  distinguished 
guests  from  abroad  and  distinguished  guests  from  home. 
We  rejoice  that,  whatever  our  relations  with  the  mother 
country  may  have  been  in  the  past,  they  are  so  cordial 
to-day. 

We  tender  to  you,  Lord  Dartmouth,  and  to  those  whom 
you  represent,  the  sincere  affection  of  well-meaning  chil- 
dren. If  our  exuberance  upon  this  occasion  is  not  equal 
to  that  manifested  by  our  elder  brothers  in  the  famous  Tea 
Party  in  Boston  Harbor,  I  assure  you  of  our  earnestnei-s 
and  our  desire  to  unite  the  English-speaking  people  for 
the  betterment  of  the  world.     (Applause.) 

The  citizens  of  New  Hampshire  take  a  great  interest  in, 
and  have  great  solicitude  for,  the  welfare  of  Dartmouih 
College.  When  your  entering  class  gets  so  large  that  you 
have  no  accommodations  for  those  who  apply,  we  rejoice 
and  sympathize  with  you.  When  Dartmouth  men,  after 
the  hotly  contested  battle  upon  the  athletic  field,  return 
to  Hanover  with  the  pennant,  we  shout  with  you  in  every 
town   in   New  Hampshire.     (Applause.)     When   fire   de- 


100  DARTMOUTH   HALL  CORNER-STONE 

stroyed  your  historic  building,  we  wept  with  you,  and 
when  its  reconstruction  is  assured,  through  the  loyalty  and 
the  liberality  of  the  men  of  Dartmouth,  we  shout  with  you 
and  will  add  our  mite  to  their  contributions.     (Applause.) 

The  interests  of  New  Hampshire  and  the  interests  of 
Dartmouth  are  so  identical  that  it  is  impossible  to  speak 
of  one  without  speaking  of  the  other.  If  you  search  the 
records  of  the  State  and  the  records  of  the  College  you  will 
find  the  same  names  in  both  places.  The  leaders  in  our 
State  affairs  have  been  Dartmouth  men  and  many  of  those 
who  have  reflected  honor  upon  their  alma  mater  have  been 
or  are  located  in  New  Hampshire  to-day.  Whatever  con- 
tributes to  the  welfare  of  New  Hampshire  contributes  to 
the  welfare  of  Dartmouth  College,  and  whatever  contrib- 
utes to  the  welfare  of  Dartmouth  College  contributes  to 
the  welfare  of  New  Hampshire. 

The  magnitude  of  a  state  is  not  measured  by  its  geo- 
graphical area,  by  its  natural  resources,  by  the  gold  in  its 
vaults,  or  the  products  in  its  storehouses,  but  by  the  men- 
tal development  and  moral  stamina  of  its  men  and  women. 
There  are  states  in  the  Union  and  countries  in  the  world 
whose  area,  natural  resources,  and  weath  far  excel  those 
of  New  Hampshire.  But  the  loyalty,  the  integrity,  and 
the  ability  of  Dartmouth  men  in  the  State,  the  Nation, 
and  the  World,  the  right  measure  by  which  to  measure  the 
magnitude  of  a  state,  will  place  New  Hampshire  in  the 
front  rank  and  second  to  none  other.     (Applause.) 

I  suppose  that  the  magnitude  of  a  college  is  not  meas- 
ured by  its  number  of  students,  by  the  cost  and  elegance 
of  its  buildings,  or  by  the  wealth  of  its  investments,  but  by 
the  excellence  of  its  finished  product.  I  am  bold  enough 
to  say  in  this  distinguished  presence  that  when  the  men  of 
Dartmouth  are  compared  with  the  men  from  the  older, 
the  more  wealthy,  and  more  populous  institutions  in  this 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  10 1 

land,  this  College  in  which  we  take  so  much  pride  will  not 
suffer  by  the  comparison.  The  citizens  of  New  Hampshire 
in  the  galaxy  of  states,  and  the  men  of  Dartmouth  in  the 
field  of  learning,  need  not  blush  for  inferiority. 

The  citizens  of  New  Hampshire  point  with  pride  to  our 
manufacturing  cities  upon  busy  rivers,  to  our  agricultural 
resources  adjacent  to  good  markets,  to  the  soundness  of  our 
financial  institutions,  and  to  the  excellence  of  our  trans- 
portation facilities,  and  we  also  point  with  pride  to  our 
grand  natural  scenery,  to  our  health-giving,  nerve-restoring 
climate,  which  afford  the  opportunity  for  the  most  desir- 
able homes  in  the  world. 

But  that  to  which  we  point  with  the  greatest  pride,  that 
which  gives  us  the  greatest  satisfaction,  is  our  educational 
system  and  the  men  and  women  who  are  the  products  of 
it.  Chief  among  this  system  is  Dartmouth  College,  and 
chief  among  those  men  and  women  are  those  who  help  to 
rule  the  world.  I  trust  that  this  College,  in  which  we  all 
take  so  much  pride,  will  go  on  and  on  and  on,  reflecting 
honor  upon  the  memory  of  its  founders,  enriching  the 
reputation  of  its  more  recent  promoters,  and  upbuilding 
the  State  and  the  Nation,  and  that  the  State  of  New 
Hampshire  will  not  lag  behind  in  service  to  the  Nation  or 
in  contributing  to  the  Nation's  honor.  Such  occasions  as 
this  contribute  to  promoting  both. 

New  Hampshire  and  Dartmouth,  "  one  and  inseparable, 
now  and  forever !  "     (Great  applause.) 


THE   NATIVE   AMERICAN   FOR  WHOM  DARTMOUTH 
COLLEGE  WAS   FOUNDED 

The  Preside7tt,  —  Some  months  ago  it  was  my  pleasure 
to  take  a  long  ride  with  Dr.  Eastman.  We  were  both  mak- 
ing the  same  station  in  Chicago,  and  on  the  way  he  related 


102  DARTMOUTH   HALL  CORNER-STONE 

to  me  —  the  narrative  being  broken  as  we  reached  the 
end  of  our  journey  —  an  old  Indian  myth  which  described 
in  stirring  words,  as  he  gave  it,  the  spiritual  side  of  Indian 
life.  As  he  left  me  under  the  thrill  and  spell  of  his  words 
I  was  almost  compelled  to  say,  "  Almost  thou  persuadest 
me  to  be  an  Indian."     (Laughter  and  applause.) 

Seriously,  gentlemen,  we  might  fare  worse  than  to  have 
in  our  veins  more  Indian  blood,  a  larger  strain  of  that  old 
aristocracy,  the  native  American,  for  whom  this  College 
was  founded.  Will  you  tell  us  about  him,  Dr.  Eastman? 
(Applause  and  cheers.) 

RESPONSE  BY  DR.  CHARLES  ALEXANDER  EASTMAN 

Mr.  Chairman  and  Gentlemen  of  the  Banquet: 
I  know  the  Indian,  perhaps,  as  well  as  any  other  class  of 
people.  At  least,  that  has  been  my  belief,  but  in  my 
wanderings  I  have  very  often  thought  that  I  did  not  know 
him,  when  eminent  men  and  the  press  have  told  me  all 
about  the  Indian  and  his  characteristics.  (Laughter.)  I 
am  like  our  distinguished  guest,  —  I  am  bewildered,  lost 
in  the  woods.     (Laughter.) 

But,  after  due  reflection,  I  am  on  the  trail  again.  (Laugh- 
ter.) When  I  came  to  Dartmouth  College  I  did  not  know 
whether  I  was  on  the  wrong  trail  or  on  the  right  trail. 
However,  I  have  the  native  perseverance  and  endurance, 
and,  always  carried  on  by  curiosity  for  the  new  thing,  I 
did  not  stop.  The  walls  of  civilization,  the  noises  of  the 
city,  did  not  terrify  me  in  coming  to  find  Dartmouth  Col- 
lege. I  was,  however,  bewildered  at  times  in  observing 
the  complexity  of  civilization,  very  often  doubting  whether 
it  was  better  than  the  old  life.  But  when  I  came  to  Dart- 
mouth College,  in  the  midst  of  all  these  warlike  noises, 
my  inspiration   immediately  arose  and   I   took   courage. 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  IO3 

(Laughter.)  Scarcely  able  then  to  talk  English,  and  I  am 
not  able  to  talk  much  better  now,  I  found  the  true  side  of 
civilization,  and  when  I  found  that,  I  found  that  man  is  the 
same  man,  whether  he  is  in  the  woods,  or  upon  the  plains, 
or  within  thick  walls.     (Laughter  and  applause.) 

I  have  had  unusual  opportunities  to  know  both  the 
primitive  man  and  the  highly  developed  man.  I  have  of- 
ten thought  that  at  Dartmouth  College  I  had  that  latter 
opportunity.  Studying  here,  I  scarcely  realized  what  I 
was  doing  in  the  first  two  years,  but  toward  the  end  of  it 
I  began  to  appreciate  what  I  was  getting. 

It  is  often  said  that  the  Indians  fled  from  civilization,  that 
they  could  not  stand  civilization,  that  they  could  not  live 
in  artificially  heated  houses,  or  thrive  on  food  that  was 
artificially  digested  or  prepared.  This  is  not  true.  Within 
a  few  years  before  I  came  to  Dartmouth  College  I  was 
absolutely  what  you  consider  and  call  a  wild  Indian, — 
and  I  was  a  bad  Indian,  for  I  was  a  live  one  !  (Laughter.) 
My  studies  and  the  life  of  civilization  have  not  injured  me 
a  bit,  physically  or  mentally.  I  call  upon  you  to  witness 
that.  I  have  developed  and  used  those  principles  and 
traits  taught  and  transmitted  to  me  by  my  ancestors. 
When  Professor  Worthen  called  upon  me  to  solve  mathe- 
matical problems,  the  quickness  of  observation  highly 
characteristic  of  the  aborigines  of  this  country  I  often 
found  very  useful.  My  quickness  to  feel  and  hear  was 
utilized,  and  the  more  I  studied  the  more  often  those 
qualities  were  called  into  use. 

The  highly  sensitive  nature  of  the  Indian  —  perhaps 
covered  with  the  old,  well-known,  stoical  visage  —  is  there, 
always  thrilling,  always  feeling,  always  listening.  With 
that  peculiarly  sensitive  nature  the  Indian  is  highly  spirit- 
ual. You  may  call  him  superstitious.  He  feels  quickly, 
and  his  first  thought  in  everything  that  he  sees  is   the 


104  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

Maker  that  he  cannot  see.  He  stands  before  a  tree  with 
admiration  and  considerable  reverence,  apparently  pray- 
ing to  that  tree,  when  he  is  really  facing  the  Great  Mys- 
tery beyond.  He  says,  "  That  is  His  handiwork,  that  is 
His  poetry,  that  is  His  art."  The  passer-by  may  mistake 
him  for  merely  worshipping  that  tree,  because  he  is  so 
ignorant,  so  apparently  feelingless.  He  stands  by  the 
rushing  river  and  listens  quietly.  "  It  is  the  voice  of  the 
Great  Mystery,"  he  says.  He  stands  under  the  pine  and 
listens.  He  says,  **  The  music  of  the  leaves  is  the  rhythm 
of  the  Great  Mystery  beyond." 

That  is  the  Indian  of  this  country.  There  is  one  charac- 
teristic of  Dartmouth  men  which  reminds  me  of  the 
original  Dartmouth  men  for  whom  this  College  was 
founded.  That  is  the  fraternal  feeling.  Friendship  is  first 
in  the  mind  of  the  North  American  Indian.  There  is 
nothing  more  binding  or  stronger  than  that  idea  of  friend- 
ship. The  Indian  never  goes  back  on  a  friend.  (Applause.) 
One  might  think  from  what  we  have  heard  from  the 
eminent  historian  to-day  that  there  are  no  Indians  in  this 
part  of  the  country,  and  hence  Dartmouth  College  has 
been  deprived  of  her  Indian  students.  I  will  ask  Dr.  Eliot 
whether  there  were  not  some  Indians  in  his  vicinity  re- 
cently? (Laughter.)  I  venture  to  say  that  there  was 
once  more  some  anxiety  among  the  population  of  Massa- 
chusetts, for  fear  of  an  outbreak  or  slaughter  at  the  hands 
of  the  aborigines  !     (Laughter.) 

The  purpose  of  this  College,  as  originally  founded,  be- 
fore it  had  matured  to  what  it  is  to-day,  was  that  the 
Indians  should  utilize  it.  The  Indians  of  this  day  were 
not  prepared  for  a  college  like  this.  But  to-day,  and  dur- 
ing the  last  score  of  years,  the  Indian  has  been  prepared 
for  entering  schools  of  this  kind.  The  government  has 
excellently  provided  for  the  Indians  of  this  country  schools, 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  I05 

common  schools  and  training  schools,  through  which 
nearly  all  of  the  Indians  of  twenty-five  years  of  age  can 
understand  and  talk  English;  and  they  are  now  mature 
and  ready  to  utilize  the  fund  that  the  ancestors  of  our 
distinguished  guest  provided  for  this  College  to  educate 
the  Indians. 

It  appears  that  all  the  colleges  of  this  country  in  the 
older  states  were  founded  in  something  of  this  same  man- 
ner. They  all  originally  had  a  provision  for  the  education 
of  the  Indian.  This,  somehow,  has  been  overlooked  and 
neglected.  In  the  West  we  have  a  great  many  Indians,  — 
270,000  to-day.  We  have  to-day  counties  controlled  by 
Indian  voters,  holding  the  balance  of  power  between  the 
two  great  parties.  We  have  Indians  who  are  lawyers  and 
can  practise  before  the  Supreme  Court.  We  have  to-day 
doctors  among  us.  Many  of  these  have  been  educated 
by  colleges  or  schools  where  there  was  no  provision  made 
by  such  excellent  people  from  abroad  as  has  been  reported 
to  us  during  these  two  days. 

I  say,  while  I  am  personally  included  among  the  men 
who  have  benefited  by  this  College,  and  while  I  shall  love 
her  as  long  as  I  shall  live,  that  this  excellent  College  should 
still  continue  to  educate  the  Indians  —  those  Indians  of  the 
western  country  —  if  possible ;  for  I  would  give  them  the 
best,  and  I  will  select  Dartmouth  College  every  time. 
(Great  applause.) 

(A  selection  was  rendered  by  the  Glee  Club.) 

THE  RELATION  OF  AMERICAN  EDUCATION  TO  THE 
ENGLISH   UNIVERSITIES 

The  President.  —  I  am  aware,  gentlemen,  that  we  have 
among  us  no  more  useful  and  no  more  consistent  foe  of 
mere  ecclesiasticism  than  President  Eliot ;  and  yet,  know- 


I06  DARTMOUTH   HALL  CORNER-STONE 

ing  this  full  well,  I  find  it  impossible  to  present  him  to  you 
to-night  except  by  borrowing  an  ecclesiastical  term.  I  re- 
ferred this  morning  to  the  primacy  of  Harvard  College, 
which  made  its  presence  always  and  everywhere  necessary. 
I  beg  to  present  to  you  at  this  time,  in  affection  and  in 
respect,  the  primate  of  the  colleges  of  New  England  and 
of  the  colleges  of  the  country,  President  Eliot.  (Applause 
and  cheers.) 


RESPONSE   BY   PRESIDENT   CHARLES   WILLIAM 
ELIOT 

Mr.  President,  Your  Excellency,  Your  Lord- 
ship: When  I  sat  down  at  this  table  to-night  I  read  for 
the  first  time  that  I  was  to  speak  to  you  on  the  relation  of 
American  education  to  the  English  universities.  This  is  a 
large  subject,  gentlemen,  and  you  will  excuse  me  if  at  this 
hour  I  touch  it  but  lightly. 

The  American  colleges  inherit  from  the  English  college. 
The  distinguished  guest  of  Dartmouth  College  intimated  a 
certain  natural  confidence  in  the  principle  of  heredity.  I 
venture  to  say  to  him  that  no  people  in  the  world  have 
a  stronger  confidence  in  the  principle  of  heredity  than  the 
Americans,  whether  we  refer  to  the  inheritance  from  genera- 
tion to  generation  of  strong  family  traits,  or  to  the  trans- 
mission from  generation  to  generation  of  established 
principles  of  civil  and  religious  liberty.  In  this  country 
we  are  firm  believers  in  the  doctrine  of  heredity. 

The  American  college  inherited  from  the  English  college 
organization,  methods  of  teaching,  knowledge,  and  the 
principle  that  education  is  the  development  of  personal 
power.  Harvard  College  derived  straight  from  an  English 
college  in  Cambridge.  Its  first  teachers  were  trained  at 
Emmanuel  College;   its  form  of  government  was  copied 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  10/ 

Straight  from  the  English  college,  when  the  Colony  char- 
tered, through  its  Governor,  Thomas  Dudley,  the  President 
and  Fellows  of  Harvard  College.  Moreover,  in  the  early 
generations  in  New  England  it  was  not  only  English 
scholarship,  but  English  benevolence,  which  developed 
the  first  schools  and  colleges  among  us.  And  it  is  an 
interesting  fact  to  recall  to-night  that  the  origin  of  Harvard 
College  was  partly  similar  in  motive  and  purpose  to  the 
origin  of  Dartmouth.  You  have  heard  during  this  festivity 
that  it  was  for  Indians  that  Dartmouth  College  was  origi- 
nally founded.  That  is  in  part  true  of  Harvard  also.  In 
the  charter  of  1650  given  by  the  Colony  it  is  expressly 
declared  that  the  President  and  Fellows  of  Harvard  Col- 
lege are  to  take  care  for  the  education  of  English  and 
Indian  youth.  Moreover,  it  was  English  benevolence 
which  built  at  Harvard  the  first  Indian  college.  To  be 
sure,  they  were  never  able  to  fill  that  building  with  In- 
dian students,  and  it  soon  passed  into  other  uses;  but 
there  is  the  fact  —  a  fact  of  the  seventeenth  century,  one 
hundred  years  before  the  Dartmouth  experiment  —  that 
English  benevolence  set  the  example  of  charitable  edu- 
cational aid  for  the  Indian  race. 

This  transmission  of  culture  across  the  Atlantic  has  gone 
right  on  across  the  continent  Let  me  illustrate  what  one 
man  can  do  to  spread  education,  to  impart  through  his 
own  personal  power  to  thousands  of  men  in  later  gener- 
ations a  new  influence  for  good  in  the  world.  I  take  as 
my  example  the  man  who  founded  at  Dartmouth  College 
its  Medical  School,  —  Nathan  Smith.  I  wonder  how  many 
of  you  Dartmouth  men  have  heard  of  him? 

Harvard  was  derived  from  Emmanuel,  through  Dunster 
and  Chauncy.  Now,  what  did  Smith  do?  In  the  first 
place,  he  derived  from  Harvard,  thus.  He  was  taught 
medicine   by  Josiah  jQoodhue,   who   graduated   in    1755, 


I08  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

Bachelor  of  Arts,  at  Harvard  College.  There  were  then 
no  medical  schools,  and  every  medical  student  learnt  his 
art  from  a  medical  practitioner;  so  Josiah  Goodhue  taught 
Nathan  Smith.  Josiah  Goodhue  stands  last  but  one  in  a 
class  of  twenty-four  men  who  graduated  at  Harvard  with 
the  degree  of  Bachelor  of  Arts,  in  1755.  What  does  that 
mean?  The  classes  were  then  arranged  in  the  order  of 
social  rank  —  not  alphabetically,  as  now,  but  in  the  order 
of  the  social  rank  of  their  parents  —  and  they  so  stand  in 
the  actual  Harvard  Quinquennial  down  to  the  Revolution. 
Josiah  Goodhue  was  the  last  but  one  in  his  class.  He  was 
doubtless  a  plain  farmer's  son,  —  but  he  taught  Nathan 
Smith  medicine. 

Who  else  was  in  that  class  of  1755  at  Harvard?  Two 
I  will  mention, — John  Adams,  Minister  to  the  Court  of 
St.  James  and  President  of  the  United  States,  and  John 
Wentworth,  Governor  of  New  Hampshire  when  Dartmouth 
College  was  here  established. 

Well,  Goodhue  taught  Nathan  Smith ;  and  Smith  began 
the  practice  of  medicine  not  far  from  this  town.  But  he 
found  on  entering  practice  that  he  needed  more  training. 
He  accordingly  reverted  to  Harvard  University  for  that 
training,  and  was  the  fifth  man  to  take  the  degree  of  Bach- 
elor of  Medicine  at  Harvard.  In  1798  he  founded  the 
Medical  School  at  Dartmouth.  He  was  a  prodigious  per- 
sonality. For  example,  he  could  teach  every  subject  in  a 
medical  school.  He  taught  anatomy,  therapeutics,  and  the 
theory  and  practice  of  both  physic  and  surgery.  As  Dr. 
Oliver  Wendell  Holmes  long  afterwards  said  of  himself,  he 
occupied  not  a  chair  but  a  settee.  (Laughter).  But  he  was 
an  admirable  teacher  in  medicine,  and  here  he  founded  the 
school  that  has  done  such  honor  to  Dartmouth  and  has 
been  so  serviceable  to  the  country.  Not  content  with  that, 
in  1 8 12  he  went  to  Yale  College  and  there  founded  the 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  109 

Medical  School  of  Yale,  all  alone  by  himself,  again  teach- 
ing every  subject.  And,  not  content  with  that,  in  1821  he 
went  to  Bowdoin,  and^  there  established  the  Medical 
School  of  Bowdoin  College.  Finally  he  gave  four  annual 
courses  in  medicine  at  the  University  of  Vermont. 

Conceive  how  that  one  personal  influence,  inherited  from 
Harvard,  spread  over  New  England,  and  what  an  incalcu- 
lably amount  of  good  Nathan  Smith  did  !  That  is  the  way, 
gentlemen,  that  we  are  all  tied  together.  That  is  the  way 
great  personal  power  works  for  the  diffusion  of  knowledge 
and  the  elevation  of  the  professions. 

This  story  of  one  strenuous  life  merely  illustrates  the 
transmissive  power,  which  is,  after  all,  Mr.  President,  the 
great  hope,  encouragement,  and  reward  of  all  men  who 
work  for  education.  The  transmissive  power  is  incalculable, 
not  to  be  predicted,  hardly  to  be  imagined. 

That  is  what  the  American  college  got  from  the  English 
college.  That  is  what  England  gave  New  England. 
(Great  applause.) 

YALE  UNIVERSITY:  THE  ALMA  MATER  OF  ELEAZAR 
WHEELOCK 

The  President.  —  It  is  a  very  great  disappointment  to 
us  that  Yale  cannot  be  represented  at  our  board  to-night 
in  the  person  of  President  Hadley.  President  Hadley  is 
fulfilling  a  long-standing  engagement  to-day  at  the  inau- 
guration at  a  neighboring  college,  Trinity,  at  Hartford. 
He  sends  in  place  this  letter  or  sentiment.  One  could 
detect  that  it  came  from  his  terse  and  yet  fertile  pen,  and  yet, 
as  you  will  see,  there  are  embarrassments  in  reading  it  : 

Yale  sends  congratulations  on  the  rebuilding  of  what  has  been 
in  many  senses  a  historical  edifice  in  the  American  college  world. 
For  nearly  three  half-centuries  Dartmouth  has  occupied  an  ex- 


no  DARTMOUTH   HALL   CORNER-STONE 

ceptional  position :  in  the  first  generation  as  the  northern  outpost 
of  American  science  and  religion  —  like  Durham  of  old  ; 
"  Half  house  of  God,  half  castle  'gainst  the  Scot ;  " 

in  the  next  generation  as  the  training  place  of  one  who,  amid  his 
many  titles  to  fame  and  honor,  has  this  special  claim  upon  the 
remembrance  of  American  scholars,  that  his  efforts  made  our  col- 
lege charters  eternally  secure ;  and  during  later  generations  as  an 
institution  whose  work  for  the  cause  of  higher  learning  is  thrown 
into  salient  relief  by  the  fact  that  where  so  many  institutions  claim 
to  do  more  than  they  actually  accomplish,  Dartmouth  accomplishes 
more  than  she  claims.  It  is  a  source  of  pride  to  me  personally 
that  my  father's  father  was  a  New  Hampshire  man  and  an  alumnus 
of  Dartmouth.  It  is  a  source  of  pride  to  all  of  us  that  Yale  grad- 
uates were  so  largely  instrumental  in  laying  the  foundations  which 
are  to-day  renewed  and  consecrated. 

THE  COLLEGE  OF  WILLIAM  AND  MARY:  THE 
FIRST  TO  IDENTIFY  GREAT  ENGLISH  NAMES 
WITH   AMERICAN   INSTITUTIONS 

The  President.  —  We  often  speak,  gentlemen,  of  the 
romantic  history  of  our  College.  There  is  a  college,  as  we 
measure  academic  distance,  far  from  us,  of  yet  more 
romantic  history,  —  almost  anticipating  Harvard  as  the 
first  college  in  this  country,  passing  through  periods  of 
great  and  striking  change,  and  more  recently  having 
passed  through  three  burnings;  but  living  now,  and  never 
so  much  alive  as  to-day.  One  representing  on  the  politi- 
cal side  the  great  prestige  of  his  name,  and  with  the  high 
repute  of  a  graduate  of  the  University  of  Virginia,  has 
taken  the  task  of  recovering  old  William  and  Mary  to  its 
original  intent.  It  is  a  great  pleasure  to  us  that  President 
Tyler  has  come  at  our  invitation  from  Virginia  to  sit  at  our 
board  to-night,  and  we  greet  him  as  he  comes.  (Applause 
and  cheers.) 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  III 

RESPONSE  BY  PRESIDENT  LYON   GARDINER 
TYLER 

Mr.  President  and  Gentlemen  :  The  honored  Gov- 
ernor present  here  to-night  set  the  example,  I  believe,  of 
stating  his  feelings  of  embarrassment  in  appearing  before 
you.  In  like  manner  I  may  describe  my  feelings  by  an 
anecdote  told  of  a  friend  of  mine  whom  I  lately  left 
in  Richmond,  —  Captain  Gordon  McCabe,  the  President 
of  the  Virginia  Historical  Society.  He  was  a  gallant  Con- 
federate soldier,  and  after  the  war  retired  to  the  shades  of 
private  life  and  opened  a  school  in  Petersburg,  Virginia. 
The  newspaper  in  the  town  tried  to  give  him  a  send-off, 
and  referred  to  him  as  **  Captain  W.  Gordon  McCabe,  the 
battle-scared  veteran."  (Laughter.)  The  next  morning 
Captain  McCabe  appeared  at  the  editor's  door  with  blood 
in  his  eye  and  pistols  in  both  hands.  The  editor  was  pro- 
fuse in  his  apologies  and  stated  that  a  proper  retraction 
and  explanation  would  appear  in  the  next  issue.  In  the 
next  issue  this  appeared  :  *'  It  is  needless  to  say  that  we  are 
horrified  at  the  dreadful  mistake  that  the  type-setter  made 
in  the  issue  of  our  paper  yesterday.  We  were  made  to 
refer  to  Captain  W.  Gordon  McCabe  as  the  *  battle-scared 
veteran.'  That  was  far  from  our  intention.  We  meant  to 
refer  to  him  as  the  *  bottle-scarred  veteran.'  "    (Laughter.) 

Following  in  the  wake  of  so  many  distinguished  speakers, 
I  don't  know  really  whether  I  am  more  "  scared "  or 
"  scarred."  I  have  some  consolation,  gentlemen,  in  re- 
membering that  I  have  read  the  eloquent  letter  of  that  dis- 
tinguished statesman,  William  Randolph  Hearst  (laughter), 
addressed  to  the  American  people  on  the  subject  of  the 
trusts.  He  stated  in  this  letter,  which  I  read  on  the  train 
coming  up  here,  that  a  great  meat-packer  had  assured  a 
visitor  to  his  establishment  that  every  part  of  the  pig  that 


112  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

entered  it  was  used  up,  except  his  squeal.     (Laughter.) 
I  can  squeal,  if  I  cannot  do  anything  else. 

But,  to  be  serious,  gentlemen,  it  affords  me  great  pleas- 
ure to  say  that  I  am  glad  to  be  here  upon  this  most  festive 
and  auspicious  occasion.  I  feel  already  at  home,  and  it  is 
due  to  two  reasons,  —  to  the  cordial  reception  I  have  re- 
ceived at  the  hands  of  so  many  whom  I  find  connected 
with  Dartmouth,  and  because  also  of  the  associations  that 
crowd  upon  my  memory. 

I  come  from  a  small  college,  which  is  situated  within  a 
stone's  throw  of  the  place  where  was  planted  a  great  many 
years  ago  the  first  permanent  English  settlement  on  this 
continent.  I  come  from  old  Virginia,  —  a  country  asso- 
ciated with  the  names  of  Queen  Elizabeth  of  England,  Sir 
Walter  Raleigh,  Sir  Humphrey  Gilbert,  King  William, 
George  Washington,  John  Marshall,  and  Robert  E.  Lee. 
(Applause.)  Every  schoolboy  knows  that  the  name  once 
given  to  all  this  vast  continent,  from  the  thirty-fourth  to 
the  forty-fifth  degree,  was  "  Virginia,"  and  the  name, 
therefore,  the  common  heritage  of  every  man  that  breathes 
under  the  star-spangled  banner  of  our  American  Union. 
And  so  as  New  Hampshire  was  carved  out  of  this  territory 
of  Virginia,  I  can  hail  the  men  of  Dartmouth  as  fellow- 
citizens  and  fellow  Virginians. 

I  am  glad  to  be  here,  gentlemen,  to  bring  to  you  the 
greetings  of  William  and  Mary  College,  to  extend  the 
right  hand  of  fellowship  to  historic  Dartmouth,  — founded, 
like  William  and  Mary,  in  the  days  when  the  country  was 
young,  and  possessing,  like  her,  an  honored  English  name. 
The  two  colleges  were  inspired  in  their  origin  by  the  same 
motives,  the  same  purposes,  the  same  objects. 

William  and  Mary  was  founded  and  chartered  in  1693, 
and  was  a  child  of  that  great  English  revolution  which 
placed  upon  the  English  throne  those  grand  monarchs, 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  II3 

King  William  and  Queen  Mary,  whose  names  are  the 
synonyms  of  liberty.  Her  spirit  was  and  has  been  the 
spirit  of  the  Bill  of  Rights  which  the  immortal  parHament 
of  that  time  proclaimed ;  and  that  Bill  of  Rights  went 
through  a  second  edition  eighty  or  ninety  years  later  in 
the  immortal  Declaration  of  Independence  drafted  by  the 
greatest  of  the  alumni  of  William  and  Mary,  Thomas 
Jefferson.      (Applause.) 

She  had  the  same  connection  with  the  Indian  race. 
The  Honorable  Robert  Boyle  died  at  about  the  time  that 
the  charter  was  obtained,  and  left  a  large  sum  of  money 
for  "  pious  and  charitable  uses."  This  sum  was  invested 
in  the  Brafferton  Lordship  in  the  North  Riding  of  York- 
shire, and  for  one  hundred  years  its  proceeds  came  to 
the  college,  and  the  college  fulfilled  its  missionary  pur- 
pose among  the  Indians  until  they  faded  away  from  the 
neighborhood  in  which  the  institution  was  situated.  And, 
in  this  same  spirit  of  fellowship  Dartmouth  and  William 
and  Mary  entered  upon  their  new  life  under  the  states  of 
the  American  Union.  When  the  unfortunate  difficulties 
broke  out  between  the  mother  country  and  the  colonies, 
the  union  between  the  colonies  was  loose  and  precarious. 
But,  as  a  bond  holding  the  ship  of  state  together,  was  a 
society  called  the  Phi  Beta  Kappa  Society,  founded  at 
William  and  Mary  on  December  5,  1776,  and  now  dis- 
tinguished as  not  only  the  first  college  fraternity  in  the 
United  States,  but  the  one  having  the  only  patriotic  ori- 
gin. A  young  Massachusetts  minister,  Elisha  Parmelee, 
who  was  a  student  at  the  college  during  the  Revolution, 
sought  and  obtained  the  right  to  establish  chapters  at 
Harvard  and  Yale,  and  soon  after  a  third  chapter  was 
established  at  Dartmouth.  There  are  now  forty  or  fifty 
chapters,  and  the  key  of  the  fraternity  passes  its  bearer  as 
a  man  of  education  and  refinement  into  any  society. 

8 


114  DARTMOUTH   HALL   CORNER-STONE 

After  this,  the  bonds  between  Dartmouth  and  William 
and  Mary  became  closer  and  closer,  as  the  years  passed 
on.  Not  infrequently  the  men  of  William  and  Mary  and 
the  men  of  Dartmouth  stood  together  in  the  conduct 
of  state  affairs.  It  was  John  Marshall,  an  alumnus  of 
William  and  Mary,  who  saved  the  charter  of  Dartmouth. 
(Applause.)  I  may  be  pardoned  for  a  personal  allusion 
when  I  mention  my  father,  President  John  Tyler,  and 
Daniel  Webster,  who  in  1841  stood  at  the  head  of  the 
national  government.  (Applause.)  When  the  Whig  party, 
contrary  to  their  professions  in  the  previous  canvass, 
forced  upon  the  President  the  issue  of  a  national  bank, 
and  all  the  rest  of  the  Cabinet,  under  the  dictation  of  Mr. 
Clay,  resigned  their  offices,  Daniel  Webster,  holding  then 
the  position  of  Secretary  of  State,  resisted  the  storm  of 
party  rancor  and  prejudice,  and  stood  by  the  President. 
He  afterwards  aided  him  in  settling  a  quarrel  with  Great 
Britain,  which  on  the  leading  feature  of  the  boundary 
line  between  Canada  and  the  United  States  (in  which,  of 
course.  New  Hampshire  had  a  great  interest),  was  com- 
plicated and  embittered  by  the  fruitless  negotiations  of 
fifty  years. 

I  may  say  to  his  Lordship  that  England  at  that  time 
was  represented  at  Washington  by  a  man  who  would  have 
done  honor  to  any  nation  and  to  any  age.  I  refer  to  Lord 
Ashburton.  (Applause.)  We  are  told  by  Mr.  Webster 
himself  that,  after  weeks  of  discussion,  the  movement  in 
reference  to  a  settlement  of  the  question,  if  any  movement 
was  made,  was  rather  backward  than  forward.  Under 
these  circumstances,  and  at  this  critical  moment,  when  it 
seemed  that  Lord  Ashburton,  tied  up  by  his  instructions, 
would  have  to  return  to  England  leaving  the  relations  of 
the  two  countries  more  than  ever  embarrassed,  President 
Tyler  called  upon  Lord  Ashburton  and  entreated  him  to  dis- 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  1 15 

regard  the  little  niceties  of  his  instructions  and  plant  himself 
upon  the  broad  platform  of  peace  and  conciliation.  I  think 
it  is  to  the  glory  —  I  know  it  is  to  the  honor  —  of  Lord 
Ashburton  that  he  yielded  to  the  President's  entreaties,  that 
he  dared  to  run  counter  to  the  wishes  of  his  government 
at  home,  and  that  he  assented  to  a  treaty  that  takes  its 
place  among  the  greatest  diplomatic  triumphs  for  peace  in 
the  history  of  the  world ;  and  that  in  doing  so,  while  he 
proved  himself  the  champion  of  the  rights  of  England,  he 
also  proved  himself  in  a  higher  sense  the  vindicator  of  the 
interests  of  mankind. 

I  wish  to  add  that  in  1846,  when  serious  charges  were 
brought  against  Mr.  Webster  regarding  his  use  of  the 
secret  service  fund.  President  Tyler  came  from  his  retire- 
ment on  his  Virginia  plantation  and  vindicated  his  old 
friend  before  the  committees  of  Congress  charged  with  an 
investigation  of  the  affair. 

As  an  alumnus  of  Dartmouth  stood  by  an  alumnus  of 
William  and  Mary  in  his  hour  of  trial,  and  as  an  alumnus 
of  William  and  Mary  stood  by  an  alumnus  of  Dartmouth 
in  his  time  of  need,  so  the  colleges  of  the  country — Yale, 
Harvard,  Dartmouth,  Hamilton,  and  the  unpretentious 
though  ancient  college  which  I  represent  —  should  stand 
by  one  another  in  the  discharge  of  the  duty  which  they 
owe  to  mankind.  They  have  the  same  common  object, 
they  are  enlisted  in  the  same  great  cause,  —  the  education 
of  the  people;  and  in  education  is  recognized  the  best 
guaranty  for  the  preservation  of  the  rights  of  man.  The 
French  have  a  saying  which  expresses  much  in  a  few 
words :  ^'  Pour  instruction  upon  the  heads  of  the  people,  — 
you  owe  them  that  baptism."  The  sentiment  is  a  just  one. 
An  educated  man  is  like  David,  the  shepherd  king  of 
Israel,  a  consecrated  man ;  and  I  venture  to  say,  gentle- 
men, that  outside  of  the  churches  of  the  living  God  the 


Il6  DARTMOUTH    HALL  CORNER-STONE 

most  sacred  altars  of  morals,  of  purity,  of  nobleness,  and 
of  civilization  are  to  be  found  in  the  halls  of  the  colleges 
of  our  land.     (Great  applause.) 


SAMUEL  KIRKLAND,  FOUNDER  OF  HAMILTON 
COLLEGE:  ELEAZAR  WHEELOCK'S  PUPIL  AND 
FELLOW-WORKER   IN   INDIAN   EDUCATION 

The  President.  —  The  relation  of  Dartmouth  College  to 
Hamilton  College  has  been  far  deeper  than  may  appear  on 
the  surface.  The  relation  has  been  one  of  a  common 
motive,  and  as  each  college  has  taken  its  own  way  it  has 
ac^ed  under  the  impulse  of  that  common  motive.  I  pre- 
sent to  you  to-night  a  trustee  and  benefactor  of  Hamilton 
College ;  and,  in  presenting  him  to  you,  I  express  the  sen- 
timent of  every  American  citizen,  that  we  honor  Hamilton 
College  in  its  graduate,  who  illuminates  every  subject  in 
politics  upon  which  he  thinks  and  concerning  which  he 
speaks  or  acts.  We  feel  that  when  he  puts  his  hand  to 
any  political  problem,  that  problem  is  solved,  not  violently, 
but  surely.  I  present  to  you  the  Honorable  Elihu  Root. 
(Applause  and  cheers.) 


RESPONSE   BY  THE   HONORABLE   ELIHU   ROOT 

Mr.  President,  Your  Excellency,  My  Lord,  Ladies, 
AND  Gentlemen  :  After  all  the  charming,  eloquent,  and 
interesting  speeches  to  which  we  have  listened,  I  feel  like 
that  inmate  of  an  insane  asylum  who  inquired  of  a  visitor 
passing  through  his  ward  if  he  had  a  piece  of  toast  about 
him.  The  visitor  said,  "No,  I  have  no  toast  about  me." 
**  I  am  sorry,"  said  the  patient,  "  that  you  have  not  a  piece 
of  toast.     The  fact  is  that  I  am  a  poached  egg,  and  I  want 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  11/ 

to  sit  down."  (Great  laughter.)  But  I  cannot  sit  down 
on  my  toast  (laughter)  without  saying  something  about  it. 

Few  men,  either  of  Dartmouth  or  Hamilton,  know  how 
conspicuous  an  illustration  the  two  colleges  are  of  that 
power  of  transmission  which  President  Eliot  has  so  clearly 
set  before  us  to-night.  In  the  year  1761  Samson  Occom, 
the  Indian  student  whose  brilliant  receptivity  of  education 
led  Eleazar  Wheelock  to  give  his  life  to  the  lines  of  in- 
struction that  ultimately  produced  Dartmouth  College, 
taking  up  his  life-work,  went  as  a  missionary  to  his  own 
people  and  established  himself  among  the  Oneidas  on  the 
banks  of  the  Oriskany  as  it  flows  into  the  Mohawk. 

In  that  year,  1761,  Samuel  Kirkland,  a  Connecticut  boy, 
became  a  student  in  Eleazar  Wheelock's  school  at  Lebanon. 
There  he  learned  the  Indian  tongue;  there  he  devoted 
himself  to  a  like  mission  with  Samson  Occom.  In  the 
year  1766,  that  year  in  which  Samson  Occom,  with 
Nathaniel  Whitaker,  was  the  vogue  in  London,  preaching 
before  princes  and  nobles  and  creating  a  notable  interest 
in  the  cause  of  Indian  education,  —  that  year,  in  which  he, 
with  Nathaniel  Whitaker,  was  getting  from  the  King  his 
gift  of  two  hundred  pounds  and  making  the  Earl  of  Dart- 
mouth the  patron  and  promoter  of  the  new  enterprise, 
Samuel  Kirkland  followed  his  friend  and  became  in  his 
turn  a  missionary  to  the  Oneidas. 

Shortly  after  came  to  the  same  place  James  Deane,  a 
graduate  of  Dartmouth  in  the  first  class,  —  a  member  of 
the  College  before  the  buildings  were  erected,  living  in  the 
wilderness  and  gathering  from  Wheelock's  inspiration  the 
same  spirit. 

For  years  these  three,  the  students  of  Wheelock  at 
Lebanon  and  at  Hanover,  labored  together  with  the  Oneidas, 
—  Samuel  Kirkland  the  leading  spirit  of  the  three.  Patient, 
enduring,  persistent,  through  perils  of  rivers  and  perils  of 


Il8  DARTMOUTH   HALL   CORNER-STONE 

forests,  amid  cruel  and  savage  foes,  enduring  the  heats  of 
summers  and  the  deep  snows  of  winters,  Hving  in  a  log 
hut,  travelling  through  the  vast  and  trackless  wilderness, 
one  by  one  he  gained  the  friendship  and  the  confidence  of 
those  fierce  warriors,  until  he  became  the  friend  and  the 
father  of  them  all.  War  swept  to  and  fro  in  the  valley  of 
the  Mohawk;  but  in  due  time,  when  peace  had  come, 
when  civilization  had  approached  near  enough  to  the  wil- 
derness, he  in  his  turn  put  into  practice  the  lessons  he  had 
learned  from  Wheelock  and  imitated  Wheelock^s  example. 

We  find  him  in  the  year  1792  attending  the  commence- 
ment of  Dartmouth,  bringing  with  him  the  Indian  chief- 
tain Onondaga;  and  in  that  same  autumn  of  1792  he  ap- 
plied to  the  newly  formed  Board  of  Regents  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  the  State  of  New  York,  at  Albany,  for  a  charter 
for  an  academy,  in  which  he  had  enlisted  the  interests  of 
Alexander  Hamilton  and  the  Patroon  Stephen  Van 
Rensselaer. 

The  charter  was  granted,  and  on  a  plot  of  land  granted 
him  by  the  faithful  Indians  he  planted  his  institution. 
In  the  deed  of  conveyance  of  the  land  he  expressed  his 
purposes  and  breathed  the  liberal  and  generous  sentiments 
of  his  preceptor,  —  so  far,  so  widely,  different  from  the  sour 
and  narrow  characteristics  which  have  too  often  appeared 
in  New  England  religious  life.  He  said  it  was  his  purpose 
to  establish  an  academy  for  the  benefit  of  the  young  set- 
tlements and  of  the  confederated  tribes  of  Indians,  "  ear- 
nestly wishing  that  the  institution  may  grow  and  flourish, 
that  the  advantages  of  it  may  be  extensive  and  lasting,  and 
that,  under  the  smiles  of  the  God  of  wisdom  and  goodness, 
it  may  prove  an  eminent  means  of  diffusing  useful  knowl- 
edge, enlarging  the  bounds  of  human  happiness,  aiding 
the  reign  of  virtue  and  the  kingdom  of  the  blessed 
Redeemer." 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  I19 

And  for  more  than  a  century,  upon  the  hillside  from 
which  the  College  spire  looks  down  to  the  north  over  the 
lands  granted  by  the  Oneidas  to  James  Deane,  and  to  the 
south  over  the  lands  granted  by  the  Oneidas  for  the  work 
of  Samson  Occom,  standing  on  the  lands  granted  by  the 
Oneidas  to  Samuel  Kirkland,  across  the  two  ranges  of 
mountains,  beyond  the  Adirondack  wilderness,  for  more 
than  a  century  the  spirit  of  Eleazar  Wheelock,  the  spirit 
that  founded  Dartmouth  and  has  made  Dartmouth  what  it 
is,  has  been  doing  the  same  work  that  the  spirit  of  Whee- 
lock has  been  doing  here.     (Applause.) 

The  specific  purpose  of  these  pious  men  has  apparently 
failed.  The  work  which  they  sought  to  do  for  the  Indian 
has  been  of  but  little  apparent  effect.  The  savage  tribes 
they  fondly  dreamed  they  could  civilize  have  passed 
away.  But  great  results,  nevertheless,  flowed  from  their 
work.  The  five  great  tribes  of  the  Iroquois  were  the  most 
formidable  warriors  and  the  most  highly  civilized  and  ad- 
vanced Indians  of  our  continent.  They  occupied  a  strate- 
gic point  in  the  continent  of  North  America.  From  their 
homes  flowed  to  the  south  the  Alleghany,  the  Susque- 
hanna, the  Delaware,  and  the  Mohawk.  To  the  north 
their  waters  ran  into  the  Great  Lakes  and  into  the  St. 
Lawrence.  Five  thousand  warriors  gathered  for  the  secur- 
ity and  the  extension  of  their  dominion.  They  controlled 
the  Indian  tribes  south  to  the  Carolinas,  west  to  the  Mis- 
sissippi, north  to  the  Lakes  and  the  St.  Lawrence,  and 
east  farther  than  the  place  where  we  are  now  standing. 
Vital  to  the  success  of  the  American  forces  in  the  Revo- 
lution was  the  aid  or  the  neutrality  of  this  formidable  band 
of  warriors,  —  men  not  merely  savages,  but  with  a  highly 
developed  political  organization,  politicians  and  statesmen ; 
and  in  the  great  struggle  which  ended  in  American  inde- 
pendence   these   three    sons    of    Dartmouth  —  Kirkland, 


I20  DARTMOUTH   HALL  CORNER-STONE 

Deane,  and  Occom  —  held  the  Oneidas  firm  as  a  rock  to 
the  American  cause  and  prevented  the  powerful  influence 
of  that  confederacy  from  waging  war  upon  Washington  and 
his  forces  in  the  rear.     (Applause.) 

The  greatest  strategic  movement  of  the  Revolution 
upon  the  British  side  was  that  in  which  Burgoyne,  pass- 
ing down  Champlain  and  the  valley  of  the  Hudson,  St. 
Leger,  passing  from  Lake  Ontario  to  Oneida  Lake, 
through  Wood  Creek,  across  the  carry,  and  down  the 
valley  of  the  Mohawk,  and  Howe,  ascending  the  Hud- 
son, were  to  concentrate  at  Albany,  cut  the  confederacy 
in  twain,  and  defeat  its  armies  in  detail.  It  was  the  work 
of  these  sons  of  Dartmouth  in  the  valley  of  the  Oriskany 
that  held  the  Oneidas  friendly  to  the  American  cause 
and  enabled  Herkimer  to  turn  back  St.  Leger  from  Fort 
Stanwix  and  defeat  that  branch  of  the  strategy,  leaving 
Burgoyne  to  fall  helpless  at  Saratoga. 

Inscrutable  are  the  dispositions  of  Providence.  Man 
proposes,  but  God  disposes.  King  George,  giving  his 
two  hundred  pounds  to  promote  the  cause  of  Indian 
education,  sets  on  foot  an  influence  which  avails  greatly 
to  cast  down  and  destroy  his  dearest  hopes  of  overcoming 
resistance  in  America.  The  Earl  of  Dartmouth,  broad- 
minded  and  far-seeing,  giving  his  patronage  and  assistance 
to  the  new  enterprise,  serves  to  contribute  greatly  to  the 
success  of  that  Washington  whose  blood  runs  in  his  veins 
and  to  make  the  name  of  his  own  ancestors  among  the 
most  illustrious  upon  earth.  (Applause.)  A  controversy 
about  the  control  of  a  little  college  in  New  Hampshire 
brings  the  genius  of  Webster  to  bear  upon  the  mighty 
mind  of  Marshall  and  produces  a  decision  in  the  Dart- 
mouth College  case  which  stands  as  a  bulwark  of  property 
and  the  rights  of  contract,  as  a  bulwark  to  the  national 
power  and  the  true  meaning  and  force  of  the  American 


ADDRESSES  AT  THE  BANQUET  121 

Constitution  for  all  time.  (Applause.)  The  pious  im- 
pulse of  Wheelock,  seeking  to  redress  the  Indian  wrongs 
suffered  in  one  hundred  and  forty  years  of  warfare,  and  to 
make  some  recompense  for  the  slaughters,  the  harryings, 
and  the  burnings  to  which  hard  necessity  compelled  our 
fathers,  fails  of  its  purpose  at  the  time,  but  sets  in  motion 
the  springs  of  action  that,  through  the  succeeding  century 
and  down  to  the  present  day,  have  animated  young  Amer- 
icans in  carrying  through  the  length  and  breadth  of  a 
great  continent  the  spirit  of  his  example,  the  character- 
istics which  he  sought  to  impress  upon  the  Indian  tribes, 
so  that  eigj^ty  millions  of  people,  men  with  consciences, 
men  with  high  ideals,  men  of  noble  purposes,  are  carrying 
forward  in  our  day,  as  they  will  in  the  days  to  come,  the 
cause  of  justice,  of  Hberty,  of  righteousness  upon  earth. 

The  spirit  of  Eleazar  Wheelock  and  of  Samuel  Kirkland, 
failing  of  their  immediate  purpose,  is  the  spirit  of  the 
American  conscience,  the  spirit  of  American  progress, 
the  spirit  of  the  American  future !  (Great  applause  and 
cheers.) 


The  President,  —  Brethren  of  the  College,  in  your 
name  I  return  the  thanks  of  the  College  to  our  distin- 
guished guests,  who  have  given  us  their  presence  this 
day,  and  declare  that  the  work  of  this  high  day  in  the 
annals  of  the  College  is  done. 


APPENDIX 


SERMON  PREACHED  BY  THE  REVEREND 
AMBROSE  WHITE  VERNON,  IN  THE  COL- 
LEGE  CHURCH,   OCTOBER   23,    1904 

Hebrews  11:40  — 12:1 

ONE  of  the  most  notable  evidences  of  the  depth  of 
the  Hfe  of  the  early  Christians  is  their  desire  to 
magnify  their  relation  to  the  past.  If  it  were  ever 
permissible  to  glory  in  the  newness  of  theology,  it  was  then. 
There  never  was  a  newer  one ;  never,  I  suppose,  an  occa- 
sion where  men  so  naturally  provided  themselves  with  new 
bottles  for  new  wine.  But  the  life  in  their  souls  was  too 
divine  for  them  to  beHeve  that  it  was  manufactured  in  one 
generation,  too  full  of  sympathy  for  man  to  lead  them  to 
minimize  the  power  and  peace  of  the  fathers.  And  so  the 
early  church  gladly  included  in  their  standard  books  the 
epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  which  exemplifies  the  grace  and 
largeness  of  a  faith  that  is  conscious  of  ancestry. 

What  the  epistle  of  the  Hebrews  emphasizes  in  the  New 
Testament  the  Webster  centennial  and  the  celebration  of 
this  week  bring  to  the  consciousnes  of  every  one  in 
Hanover.  We  are  living  no  momentary  life ;  we  are  par- 
taking an  eternal  one.  We  give  over  the  claim  to  exclu- 
sive rights  in  ourselves.  Our  pride  and  our  frivolity  are 
alike  shameful  to  us,  as  we  become  aware  of  the  great 
cloud  of  witnesses  by  which  we  are  encircled ;  the  sense 
of  our  vast  obligation  to  the  dead  bestows  upon  us  an 
august  value  that  is  not  readily  detected  in  the  every-day 
egotists  that  we  are. 

*'  Honor  thy  father  and  mother  "  is  not  merely  a  natural 
sentiment;  it  is  one  of  the  few  essentials  of  religion;  it  is 


126  DARTMOUTH   HALL    CORNER-STONE 

one  of  the  requirements  that  the  Lord  made  of  the  young 
man  who  desired  to  be  assured  of  eternal  Hfe.  That  man 
is  rightfully  called  impious,  who  plans  his  life  with  no 
thought  of  fulfilling  the  loftiest  purposes  of  the  mother 
who  passed  from  this  world  into  the  next,  thinking  of  him. 
But  the  past,  to  which  a  man  belongs  by  right  of  his  crea- 
tion, does  not  only  consist  of  his  personal  ancestors.  It 
consists  of  all  those  influences  out  of  the  bygone  centuries 
which  mould  his  life.  And  this  is  certainly  one  of  the 
greatest  benefits  of  the  institutions  of  society,  —  that  they 
bring  into  the  horizon  of  the  most  short-sighted  the  won- 
drous achievements  of  this  creative  past.  The  state,  the 
college,  the  church,  well-nigh  visualize  the  unseen.  As 
they  rear  their  tremendous  ramparts  before  us,  and  we 
realize  that  they  are  not  to  be  scaled ;  that  within  two  of 
them  we  were  born  and  that  the  gates  of  the  third  are 
thrown  open  at  our  timid  approach,  then  it  is,  I  think, 
that,  for  the  first  time,  we  apprehend  the  security  and 
majesty  of  our  lives.  For  me  they  assume  the  place  of 
those  horses  and  chariots  of  fire  that  the  young  man, 
whose  eyes  God  opened,  saw  round  about  Elisha.  When, 
by  the  height  and  solidity  of  those  towers,  we  measure  the 
tremendous  forces  which  have  been  expended  to  secure 
our  safety,  our  knowledge,  and  our  peace,  we  begin  to 
understand  why  the  very  hairs  of  our  head  are  numbered. 
And  of  all  possible  human  life,  that  must  always  be  the 
largest  and  the  completest  that  enters  with  solemn  and 
surprised  delight  into  the  rights  of  the  citizen  of  the  state, 
the  learner  in  the  school,  the  worshipper  in  the  church. 
To  be  reminded  of  the  struggles  and  the  ceaseless  toil  and 
the  splendid  triumphs  of  the  past  tends  not  to  shackle  but 
to  liberate  the  profound  impulses  of  our  souls.  And  the 
increasing  reverence  of  mankind  for  the  past,  which  is  only 
a  peculiarly  affectionate  expression  of  reverence  for  God, 


SERMON  BY   REV.   AMBROSE  WHITE  VERNON         \2^ 

is  shown  in  the  sumptuous  commemorative  expositions  of 
the  state,  the  centennials  and  sesquicentennials  of  our  col- 
leges, and  the  wider  observance  of  the  church  year  by  all 
our  religious  bodies.  We  of  this  community  are  particu- 
larly fortunate  in  having  brought  so  prominently  to  our 
notice  this  week  that  it  is  the  courageous  and  high-souled 
Founder  of  the  College  that  has  the  best  right  to  be  con- 
sidered as  the  creator  of  its  present  fortune,  and  that  the 
most  honored  of  the  patrons  of  its  infancy  is  still  regarded 
as  the  most  fitting  person,  through  the  hand  of  his  de- 
scendant, to  lay  the  corner-stone  of  its  great  future. 

It  is  not  my  desire  to  tell  this  morning  the  fascinating 
and  thrilling  tale  which  will  be  brilliantly  set  forth  on 
Wednesday.  Simply  permit  me  in  passing  to  congratulate 
every  citizen  of  Hanover,  and  particularly  every  student 
and  graduate  of  Dartmouth,  on  being  connected  with  an 
institution  that  was  a  direct  offspring  of  one  of  the  most 
vital  religious  awakenings  the  land  has  ever  known,  an 
institution  that  had  for  its  avowed  purpose  the  uncovering 
of  the  eyes  of  the  blind  to  the  splendor  of  the  Christian 
life,  and  that  owes  its  name  to  a  nobleman  who,  while  as 
loyal  as  any  to  high  responsibilities  of  state,  was  most  out- 
spoken of  all  in  his  loyalty  to  the  uncompromising  religion 
of  Jesus  Christ,  and  who  supported  this  College  solely  in 
order  that  the  profound  faith  of  Christ  might  through  it 
become  the  possession  of  a  larger  portion  of  mankind. 
I  congratulate  you  therefore  most  of  all  that  to  be  pos- 
sessed of  Dartmouth  spirit  in  the  historic  and  distinguishing 
sense  is  to  be  possessed  of  an  adamantine  trust  upon  the 
Sublime  Figure  of  the  human  race  and  an  intense  enthusi- 
asm for  His  service. 

My  purpose  this  morning  is  to  call  attention  to  the 
most  exalted  method  of  discharging  our  obligation  to  the 
past,  an  obligation  that  is  so  well  symbolized  by  those 


128  DARTMOUTH    HALL   CORNER-STONE 

words  of  Joshua  which  were  aptly  quoted  to  us  on  Thurs- 
day night :  "  And  I  gave  you  a  land  whereon  thou  hadst 
not  labored,  and  cities  which  ye  built  not,  and  ye  dwell 
therein;  of  vineyards  and  oliveyards  which  ye  planted 
not,  do  ye  eat."  Receiving  this  unmerited  bounty  at  the 
hands  of  those  who  have  worked  for  us  with  more  intention 
than  did  the  Canaanites  for  the  men  of  Israel,  how  shall 
we  best  discharge  our  vast  debt  to  them  ? 

The  traditionalist  says :  "  By  keeping  out  the  weeds  and 
planting  no  modern  and  therefore  inferior  seed  of  our 
own."  The  indifferentist  says :  "  By  keeping  the  soil  at 
the  same  standard  of  efficiency  in  which  we  received  it." 
The  man  who  reveres  the  past  says :  "  By  increasing  its 
efficiency  to  the  limit  of  our  strength." 

I  wish  to  put  before  you  two  grounds  for  adopting  the 
last  of  the  three  answers  for  our  own. 

The  first  is  that  in  order  to  keep  the  land  in  the  same 
fertile  condition  in  which  we  found  it,  we  must  be  con- 
tinually replenishing  it ;  in  other  words  the  only  wise  con- 
servatism is  a  healthy  radicalism.  The  man  who  makes 
his  father's  name  respected  is  he  that  has  done  most  for 
his  own.  The  capital  we  receive  by  inheritance  would  be 
robbed  of  its  value  unless  new  projects  were  constantly 
being  undertaken,  which  maintain  the  rate  of  interest. 
The  reason  why  so  much  of  our  capital  is  safely  invested 
in  traditional  ways  is  because  there  are  those  who  find 
new  methods  of  investment  for  theirs.  The  older  methods 
of  investment  are  not  sufficient  for  the  accumulating  capi- 
tal of  to-day.  It  is  after  all  the  financiers  that  are  both 
wise  and  daringthat  render  the  rest  of  us  secure.  So  in  the 
great  matters  of  state  it  is  the  man  that  faces  the  future  in 
the  most  untrammelled  spirit  that  best  conserves  the  past. 
It  is  only  he  who  underrates  the  mighty  power  of  the  past 
that  fears  that  we  shall  cut  loose  from  it.     When  the  past 


SERMON  BY  REV.  AMBROSE  WHITE  VERNON        1 29 

is  put  by  with  scorn,  it  tramples  upon  its  scorners.  Out  of 
the  frenzy  of  a  French  Revolution  a  despotism  is  born. 
When,  in  a  moment  of  arrogance,  we  see  the  great,  power- 
ful Cromwell,  in  proroguing  the  Long  Parliament,  lifting 
the  sacred  mace,  and  saying,  "  What  shall  we  do  with  this 
bawble  ?  Take  it  away !  "  we  do  not  wonder  that  it  re- 
turned to  crush  his  protectorate.  The  new  will  last  if  it 
reverence  and  fulfil  the  old  ;  if  not  it  will  but  prepare  the 
way  for  a  great  reaction,  whether  it  be  theology,  education, 
or  a  theory  of  government.  But  the  man  that  most  re- 
veres the  power  that  has  been  placed  without  personal 
merit  into  his  hands  by  God's  long  centuries  is  he  that 
feels  most  serene  amid  untried  problems,  assured  that  a 
noble  future  is  bound  to  be  the  product  of  a  sacred  past. 
Lincoln  was  among  the  most  radical  of  the  men  of  his 
time,  but  he  preserved  the  country,  not  Clay.  There  is 
not  much  doubt  that  his  reverence  for  Washington  and 
the  fathers  gave  him  the  power  to  take  a  step  in  advance 
of  them.  Indeed,  the  great  enthusiasm  for  the  Union  that 
in  those  glorious  days  was  so  much  more  widespread  and 
effective  than  the  enthusiasm  for  freeing  the  slaves,  was 
the  product  of  a  mighty  reverence  for  a  sacred  past,  and 
it  was  this  very  reverence  that  remade  the  country  on  dif- 
ferent and  nobler  lines.  It  preserved  the  Union  by  mak- 
ing it  over  again.  In  education  it  is  the  same.  The  new 
fields  of  science  have  not  only  commanded  new  forces  to 
till  them,  but  they  have  invigorated  the  laborers  on  the 
older  fields ;  never,  for  example,  have  men  understood  the 
glories  of  the  Scripture  as  to-day.  The  history  of  Christian 
doctrine  proves  that  it  is  only  the  heretic  that  keeps  theology 
alive.  In  any  science  it  is  the  discoverer  of  the  new  that  best 
demonstrates  the  worth  of  the  old.  And  in  religion  this  law 
is  as  true  as  in  government  or  education.  Amos  set  off 
the  Hebrew  nation  on  a  new  and  unparalleled  service  of 

9 


I30  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

God  when  he  bade  them  to  drop  their  ancestral  ritual  and 
betake  themselves  to  justice,  but  it  was  in  the  name  of  the 
God  of  their  fathers  that  he  adjured  them  so  to  do.  Jesus 
Christ  came  heralding  the  establishment  of  the  kingdom 
of  God  on  earth,  the  least  citizen  of  which  was  greater 
than  the  greatest  prophet,  yet  he  announced  that  he  had 
not  come  on  an  errand  of  destruction  but  of  fulfilment.  It 
was  the  traditionalist,  the  conservative,  that  was  doing  the 
destroying;  it  was  necessary  to  trim  the  law  at  a  hun- 
dred points  to  save  its  massive  trunk.  Luther  turned  the 
world  upside  down,  but  he  did  so  because  Paul  nerved  him 
to  the  deed.  Adaptation  to  environment  is  the  necessary 
law  of  all  life.  The  only  way  to  save  America  is  by  driv- 
ing it  onward ;  the  only  way  to  maintain  Dartmouth  is  by 
some  method  of  enlargement,  not  necessarily  numerical ; 
the  only  way  to  be  able  to  say  our  prayers  in  faith  is  to 
make  them  larger  every  day  and  to  induce  the  Malay  and 
Hottentot  to  join  in  them. 

The  first  reason  then  for  paying  our  obligation  to  the 
past  by  seeking  to  transcend  it  is  that  only  so  will  we 
save  it.  But  there  is  a  second  and  a  mightier  reason.  It 
is  that  the  spirit  of  the  past,  which  is  more  important  than 
its  achievements,  is  nothing  else  than  the  spirit  of  progress. 
The  vineyards  that  Israel  had  not  planted  did  not  grow 
wild;  their  Canaanite  possessors  had  planted  them,  and 
when  they  planted  them  they  were  radicals ;  they  made 
short  work  of  most  ancient  thorns.  And  so  have  these 
ancestors  of  ours  been  pioneers  in  things  of  government, 
of  education,  and  religion.  The  spirit  of  the  past  is  a  spirit 
of  progress.  Who  come  most  readily  to  mind  when  we 
think  of  the  great  cloud  of  witnesses  of  the  past?  How 
about  Euclid  and  Copernicus  and  Galileo  and  Newton  and 
Darwin?  How  about  Caesar  and  Justinian,  Giotto  and 
Michael  Angelo,   Washington   and    Cromwell,    Paul    and 


SERMON  BY  REV.  AMBROSE  WHITE  VERNON        I31 

Luther,  Shakespeare  and  Chaucer  and  Wordsworth  and 
Browning?  How  about  Socrates  and  Buddha?  Moses 
and  Amos?  Pestalozzi  and  Froebel?  How  about  the 
prophets  and  the  Lord?  These  creators  of  the  past, 
were  they  men  that  feared  to  leave  their  own  country? 
Or  were  they  men  that  obeyed  the  mighty  impulses  of 
their  own  hearts  and  went  out  not  knowing  whither  they 
went?  How  about  Wheelock  himself,  whom  in  a  way  we 
celebrate  afresh  ?  When  he  gave  himself  over  to  the  new 
life  that  Whitefield  brought,  despite  the  scorn  of  the 
learned,  was  he  a  small  traditionalist  then?  When  he 
went  forth  into  the  scantily  settled  provinces  of  New 
Hampshire  and  became  a  voice  crying  in  the  wilderness, 
was  he  trying  to  keep  what  he  had  or  trying  to  take  his 
part  in  creation  ?  It  is  true  that  he  had  the  defects  of  his 
qualities.  He  was  a  very  faulty  and  suspicious  and  domi- 
neering man.  Whitefield  was  quite  right  in  writing  him  : 
**  The  best  souls  are  liable  sometimes  to  mistake  fancy  for 
faith,  and  imagination  for  revelation.  My  advice  is  to 
contract  instead  of  enlarging."  And  yet  Dartmouth  owes 
its  existence  to  the  rejection  of  that  excellent  advice,  to 
the  triumph  of  huge  religious  impulses  over  the  spirit  of 
hesitancy  and  criticism.  It  is  better  to  be  a  cantankerous 
optimist  than  an  amiable  cynic;  it  is  truer  to  the  great 
deeds  of  the  past.  Criticism  is  superb  in  its  place,  but  its 
place  is  the  clearing  away  of  debris  after  some  mighty 
building  has  been  planned.  Those  men  pay  best  their 
debt  to  the  race,  not  who  criticise  every  proposition  be- 
cause it  does  not  conform  to  accepted  standards,  but  who 
feel  themselves  borne  along  by  the  mighty  life  of  the  past 
to  something  as  new  and  as  true  as  the  founding  of  a  col- 
lege in  the  wilderness  or  the  unshackling  of  the  fetters  of  a 
rusty  tradition.  As  Crothers  has  recently  pointed  out, 
that  is  what  Paul  meant  when  he  told  the  timid  converts 


132  DARTMOUTH  HALL  CORNER-STONE 

that  they  were  children  of  Abraham  who  because  of  faith 
in  God  dared  to  follow  a  divine  leader,  rather  than  they 
that  kept  a  ritual,  which  however  old  was  sometime  new. 
It  was  not  worshipping  God  in  the  Jewish  temple  that 
made  a  man  true  to  the  past,  it  was  sharing  the  reckless 
trust  that  made  Abraham  the  father  of  the  faithful. 

And  so  at  last  we  come  to  the  text,  which  it  seems  to 
me  is  one  of  the  remarkable  verses  in  our  Testament.  The 
cloud  of  witnesses  of  which  its  author  speaks  was  not  a 
nebulous  cloud.  It  was  made  up  of  very  distinct  and  definite 
heroes  of  faith.  He  had  made  a  catalogue  of  the  men 
who  to  him  were  the  greatest  souls  in  the  world.  So  per- 
tinent, so  concise  is  his  description  of  each  that  you  would 
almost  think  he  were  conferring  degrees  for  excellence  in 
faith.  And  the  whole  catalogue  exposed  him  to  a  most 
obvious  retort.  "  All  these  men,"  his  opponents  could  so 
easily  say,  were  constantly  saying,  "  all  these  men  achieved 
their  victories  and  glorified  their  God  without  the  slightest 
knowledge  of  this  Lord  Jesus  of  yours."  "  I  know  it,"  says 
this  wonderful  man.  "  These  all,  having  had  witness  borne 
to  them  through  their  faith,  received  not  the  promise,  God 
having  provided  some  better  thing  for  us,  that  they  without 
us  should  not  be  made  perfect."  Was  there  ever  audacity 
so  great?    Was  there  ever  anything  more  incontrovertible? 

This  unknown  man,  who  had  looked  into  the  face  of 
Christ,  felt  himself  at  one  with  the  greatest  men  of  the  uni- 
verse, because  he  believed  that  he  possessed  their  very 
spirit  of  creative  trust,  and  because  he  believed  that  he  and 
his  few  friends  were  called  by  God  to  complete  the  lives 
of  Abraham,  of  Moses,  of  all  the  prophets,  by  pushing  the 
conquests  of  their  faith  to  an  undreamt  success !  He  was 
no  egotist ;  egotists  do  not  forget  to  tell  us  their  names ! 
He  was  a  humble  soul  who  had  come  into  the  possession 
of  so  supremely  satisfying  a  life  that  this  great  cloud  of 


SERMON  BY  REV.  AMBROSE  WHITE  VERNON        1 33 

witnesses  that  had  not  shared  it  explained  it  instead  of 
crushing  it.  He  understood  why  it  was  so  great,  —  it  was 
the  product  of  all  God's  saints ;  he  understood  his  exulta- 
tion, —  he  was  annexing  great  unclaimed  areas  to  the 
Kingdom  of  God. 

With  this  majestic  insight  into  our  life,  as  well  as  his,  let 
us  come  into  that  reverence  for  ourselves,  which  those 
should  feel  that  are  the  vessels  of  God,  bearing  His  life 
to  some  great  goal  beyond  us.  We  can  be  true  to  the 
Founder  of  Dartmouth,''as  we  carry  on  that  work  to  which 
he  consecrated  his  imperious  but  courageous  life,  only  as 
we  live  and  study  in  the  atmosphere  of  a  *'  great  awaken- 
ing," which  I  verily  believe  is  upon  us,  only  as  we  become 
possessed  by  some  great  purpose,  larger  and  diviner  than 
his,  that  shall  carry  this  College  with  a  clear,  strong  voice 
into  the  wilderness  of  our  dust-blown,  modern  life,  pro- 
claiming and  bringing  peace.  Above  all,  we  shall  be  true 
to  Christ,  the  real  Founder  of  this  College,  only  as,  with  un- 
sandaled  feet  and  bated  breath,  we  realize  that  He  without 
us  shall  not  be  made  perfect.  My  friends,  this  lesson  is 
that  which  I  pray  may  be  impressed  on  both  you  and  me ; 
that  he  that  throws  away  his  life  sins  against  the  holy  cen- 
turies that  wait  to  come  to  fruition  in  it,  that  he  commits 
not  suicide,  not  even  homicide,  but  that  crime  which  made 
old  savage  Eli  start  with  nameless  dread  and  say,  "  If  one 
man  sin  against  another,  God  will  interpose  for  him,  but  if 
a  man  sin  against  God,  who  will  interpose  for  him?" 

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